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PUBLIC EDUCATION IN 
CALIFORNIA 

ITS ORIGIN AND DEVELOPMENT, WITH 

PERSONAL REMINISCENCES OF 

HALF A CENTURY 



BY 

JOHN SWETT 




AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY 

NEW YORK .-. CINCINNATI :\ CHICAGO 






v^ ^ 



Copyright, 1911, by 
JOHN SWETT 



Entered at Stationers' Hall, London 
Public Educ. in Cal. 

W. P. I 



\ 



©CI.A28B624 



PREFACE 



After my retirement from active public-school service, 
a number of my friends urged me, as a matter of duty that 
I owed to my profession, to prepare for publication a volume 
which should include an outline of my long and varied 
experience in educational affairs. 

Rather reluctantly, I finally ventured on the experiment 
of writing a book in which the personal narrative should 
be made the thread for binding together various educational 
footnotes, including sketches of the common schools and 
rural academies which I attended in New Hampshire about 
the middle of the nineteenth century, and also the salient 
points in the development of public schools in California, 
the state which opened for me the gate of opportunity. 

It has not been easy for me to write about my own work, 
and I have ceased to wonder why the autobiographies of 
American public school teachers are so few in number. 
' Born and bred in New England, even the warmth of Cali- 
fornia sunshine has never quite thawed out that Puritan 
reticence which is mine by heredity and early environment. 

The manuscript copy of this volume has been read, in part 
or in whole, by more than a score of professional teachers, 
to whom I am indebted for wholesome criticism as well as 
for warm commendation. I am under special obligations 
to Dr. Elmer Ellsworth Brown, United States Commissioner 
of Education, and to Dr. Nicholas Murray Butler, President 
of Columbia University, for personal interest in my work. 
Furthermore, I deeply appreciate the helping hands of the 
officers and members of the Schoolmasters' Club, and of 
the California State Teachers' Association. 

Hill Girt Farm, Martinez, California, 1910. 



CONTENTS 



CHAPTER PAGE 

I. The Genesis of the American Common Schools ... 9 
II. My New England Environment 24 

III. My Boyhood Home, Early School Days, and the 

Age of Homespun 38 

IV. Pittsfield Academy; Mr. Edwin F. Sherman, the 

Ideal Principal; My Vacation Wages 57 

v. student' and teacher 6/ 

VI. Gold Mining Days in California 86 

VII. The Making of a Grammar School in San Fran- 
cisco . .• 105 

VIII. My First Political Campaign 140 

IX. Official Work and Personal Reminiscences 148 

X. My Second Term of Office, and the Revised 

School Law of California 174 

XL My Final Biennial Report 182 

XII. Principal of the Denman Grammar School and 

Deputy Superintendent of Schools 19S 

XIII. Principal of the Girls' High School and Normal 

Class of San . Francisco 220 

XIV. Election as City Superintendent of Public . 

Schools in San Francisco 243 

4 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAGE 

XV. Outlines of the California Public School System 
as A Whole in the First Decade of the Twenti- 
eth Century 258 

XVI. The Professional Spirit of California Teachers 
as Exhibited in State and County Teachers' 
Institutes 268 

XVII. My Pilgrimage to New England in Quest of Early 
Town Records Relating to the Beginnings of 
Common Schools 274 

XVIII. Our Home Life at Hill Girt Farm; My Class in 
History and Literature ; and Incidental Educa- 
tional Work , 3 02 



SUMMARY OF THE EDUCATIONAL WORK 
OF THE AUTHOR 

Positions as Teacher and as School Superintendent 

i. Teacher of the Buck Street district school in Pembroke, N. H., two 
winter terms of four months each, in the years 1847 an d 1848. (p. 68.) 

2. Teacher of the district school, No. 1, in West Randolph, Massachu- 
setts, for two winter terms, in the years 1849 an d 1850. (p. 76.) 

3. Assistant teacher in Pembroke Academy (N. H.), in 1850. (p. 79.) 

4. Principal of Rincon Grammar School, San Francisco, 1853 to 1862. 
(p. 105.) 

5. State Superintendent of Public Instruction, in California, 1862 to 1867, 
five years, (pp. 146-197.) 

6. Principal of Denman Grammar School, San Francisco, 1868 to 1870, 
and also principal of the Lincoln Evening School, (pp. 198-206.) 

7. Deputy Superintendent, San Francisco, 1870 to 1873. (p. 206.) 

8. Principal of Denman Grammar School, 1873 to 1876. (p. 218.) 

9. Principal of San Francisco Girls' High School and Normal Class, 
1876 to 1889, thirteen years, (pp. 219-242.) 

10. City Superintendent, San Francisco, 1892 to 1896, four years, (pp. 

243-257-) 

Author of Public School Reports 

Thirteenth Annual Report of the Superintendent of Public Instruction, 
State of California, 1863. (p. 165.) 

First Biennial Report of same, 1864 and 1865. (p. 177.) 

Second Biennial Report, 1866 and 1867. (p. 182.) 

Reports as Deputy Superintendent of Public Schools, San Francisco, 187 1, 
1872, and 1873. 

Annual Reports of the Superintendent of Public Schools of San Francisco, 
1892 to 1895, three reports, (pp. 248, 255.) 

Educational Books 

History of the Public School System of California (1876), A. L. Bancroft 
& Co. (p. 226.) 

Normal Word Book (1876), Ivison, Blakeman & Taylor, N. Y. 
Methods of Teaching (1880), Harper & Brothers, (p. 227.) 

6 



EDUCATIONAL WORK OF THE AUTHOR 7 

School Elocution (1886), H. H. Bancroft & Co. 

American Public Schools: Their History and Pedagogics (1900), Ameri- 
can Book Company, (pp. 301, 316.) 

Joint Author with William Swinton, of: Swinton's Word Book and Word 
Primer; Swinton's Language Primer and Language Lessons; Swinton's 
School Composition; Swinton's Elementary Geography and Comprehensive 
Geography, (p. 209.) 

Addresses and Papers 

1. Reading and Elocution in the Common Schools; State Teachers' Con- 
vention, 1854. Published in the Pacific, 1854. 

2. Address at the Dedication of the Rincon Schoolhouse, 1854. Pub- 
lished in the San Francisco Sun, 1854. (p. 109.) 

3. A Plea for the Study of Nature; State Teachers' Convention at San 
Francisco, 1855. Published in the Pioneer Magazine, 1855. 

4. School Gymnastics and Object Lessons; California State Teachers' 
Institute at San Francisco, 1861. "Institute Proceedings," 1861. 

5. The Schools and the Commonwealth; San Francisco Teachers' Asso- 
ciation, 1862. Published in The Bulletin, 1862. (p. 146.) 

6. Duties of the State to Common Schools; California State Teachers' 
Institute, 1863. "Institute Proceedings," 1863. 

7. Concerning Common Sense in Teaching; California State Teachers' 
Institute, 1863. "Institute Proceedings," 1863. (p. 162.) 

8. Our State School Law; California State Teachers' Institute, 1865. 
"Institute Proceedings," 1865. 

9. Educational Progress; State Teachers' Institute, 1867. "Institute 
Proceedings," 1867. (p. 191.) 

10. The Annual Reexamination and Reelection of Teachers; National 
Educational Association, Boston, 1872. "Proceedings," 1872. (p. 213.) 

11. The Relation of the State to School Books and Appliances; National 
Educational Association at San Francisco, 1888. "Proceedings," 1888. 
(p- 236.) 

12. Evolution of the American Public School System; California State 
Teachers' Association, Santa Rosa, 1898. "Proceedings," 1898. (p. 255.) 

13. Monograph on the Elementary Schools of California; written for the 
Cal. Dep't of Educ. in the Louisiana Purchase Exposition at St. Louis, 1904. 

14. Concerning Some Common-Sense Ways of Interesting Public School 
Children in Nature Studies relating to Agriculture, Horticulture, Viticulture, 
and Farm Life. State Teachers' Association at Berkeley, 1905. "Proceed- 
ings," 1906, 




John Swett 
1910 



(8) 



PUBLIC EDUCATION IN 
CALIFORNIA 



CHAPTER I 

The Genesis of American Common Schools 

To comprehend clearly the origin and progress of com- 
mon schools in America, it is necessary to consider briefly 
the chartered civil rights given by the English government 
to the Puritan colonists of New England. 

The Company of Massachusetts Bay was organized 
in England by about a hundred influential Puritans for 
the purpose of making a settlement in New England 
where the people of their own religious belief should be 
free from the domination of the bishops of the established 
church of England, The stockholders in this company 
purchased from the Council for New England a narrow 
tract of land bordering on the Atlantic and extending 
indefinitely westward. The royal charter granted to this 
corporate company and signed by Charles II (1629) pro- 
vided for a governor, a deputy governor, and a board of 
eighteen " assistants." The Company immediately dis- 
patched a vessel which carried away to New England a 
hundred colonists under the lead of John Endicott, who was 
appointed governor. These colonists made a settlement at 
Salem. 

In 1630 twelve leading members of the Company, all 
men of means and of education, including the scholarly 

9 



IO GENESIS OF AMERICAN COMMON SCHOOLS 

John Winthrop, petitioned the General Court for leave to 
hold all future meetings of the Company in New England 
instead of in London, pledging themselves to go with the 
colonists and there make their home. The request was 
granted, and the same year the Company fitted out thirteen 
vessels which carried away nearly a thousand colonists, 
among whom were Governor John Winthrop and deputy 
governor Thomas Dudley, together with ten of the board 
of " assistants." When they reached their destination 
Governor Winthrop selected a place for settlement on 
Massachusetts Bay and named it Boston after the city of 
Boston in the mother country. 

The charter of the Company provided an annual election, 
by the stockholders, of a board of eighteen " assistants," 
and for an annual election, by the assistants, of a governor 
and deputy governor, who, with the assistants, were to con- 
stitute a " general court," empowered to enact laws, to 
appoint magistrates, to make grants of land to colonists, 
levy taxes, and admit settlers to the "freedom of the 
colony," or, in other words, to give them the right of suffrage 
in town meeting. When the first colonial election was 
called, October, 1630, there were only twenty qualified 
electors in the colony, and of these the old board of assistants, 
including the governor and his deputy, constituted a major- 
ity. The old members of the board of assistants were 
reelected for another year, and the assistants reelected 
Governor John Winthrop. The General Court then 
proceeded to admit one hundred and eight colonists as 
" freemen" qualified to vote in town meeting. As a 
matter of course all of these new citizens were safe and true 
men, members of some Congregational Puritan church. 
The second meeting of the General Court, held May 18, 



PURITAN GOVERNMENT IN MASSACHUSETTS II 

1 63 1, passed the following order: — "For time to come 
no man shall be admitted to the freedom of the body 
politic, but such as are members of some of the churches 
within the limits of the same." 1 

No magistrate could be appointed by the General Court 
unless he was a Puritan church member. It followed that 
the early colonial magistrates or judges were zealous in 
punishing, or fining, or banishing heretics such as Roger 
Williams, Anne Hutchinson, John Wheelwright, and the 
Quakers. But it must be borne in mind that at this time 
the idea of separating church from state had hardly entered 
into the minds of men, and suffrage based on manhood 
was dreamed of only by " visionaries." Year by year the 
number of freemen in the colony was so cautiously 
increased that at the end of four years, when the number of 
inhabitants was upwards of three thousand, the number of 
freemen was barely three hundred. 2 

This year (1634) marked the beginning of rapid modi- 
fications of the civil government in the Bay colony. The 
new " towns" adjacent to Boston, such as Charlestown, 
Roxbury, Dorchester, Newtown (now Cambridge), and 
Salem, claimed the right of sending " delegates," two from 
each town, to represent their interests at the annual session 
of the General Court. The privilege was granted, and this 
marked the beginning of representative government. The 

1 (Massachusetts Records, Vol. I.) 

2 The following is the form of the "Freeman's Oath" as administered by 
the magistrates in 1634: — 

" I do solemnly bind myself that I will give my vote and suffrage as I 
shall judge in mine own conscience may best conduce to the public weal; 
so help me God." 

It is hard to find in colonial records a finer example of a vital principle 
condensed into idiomatic English. 



12 GENESIS OF AMERICAN COMMON SCHOOLS 

next step was to curtail the power of the governor and the 
board of assistants by a law that no colonial taxes should 
be levied except by the representative delegates elected 
by the several towns. Then followed the demand for a 
written constitution, and a commission was appointed by 
the General Court "to frame a body of laws in resemblance 
to a magna charta." Following this, came the substitu- 
tion of written ballots instead of counting votes by a show 
of hands. 

In 1635, the scholarly Puritan statesman, Sir Henry 
Vane, came over from the English court to cast his lot 
with the infant colony. The following year (1636) he 
was elected governor of the colony of Massachusetts Bay. 
This was the year that the talented Puritan minister, 
Thomas Hooker, led his whole congregation of a hundred 
members away from the vicinity of Boston to the beautiful 
valley of the Connecticut River, and there founded a new 
town named Hartford, in which the right of voting in 
town meeting was not limited to members of the Con- 
gregational churches. It was during this same year that 
Roger Williams, another liberal Puritan clergyman, ban- 
ished from the Bay colony for "heresy," went out into 
the wilderness among the Indians and founded the Rhode 
Island colony. 

It is in the colonial town meetings for the manage- 
ment of local affairs that we find the democratic side of 
self-government, differing from the somewhat aristocratic 
and ecclesiastical organization of the General Court. 
These meetings, in the beginning, were called whenever 
required by urgent business or by military necessity, but 
in general once a year. In the original Anglo-Saxon or 
Teutonic tun moote (town meeting) , the sole test of a voice 



COLONIAL TOWN MEETINGS 1 3 

in the proceedings was the ability to bear arms and to 
light. The New England town meeting was a partial 
revival of an institution which, in the mother country, 
had been merged into the ecclesiastical organization of the 
established church of England, controlled by the king 
and the bishops. 

The most important officers of the colonial town 
were the selectmen, three in number, who constituted 
a board for the general management of local business 
affairs. They appraised the value of taxable property, 
apportioned the taxes voted in town meeting for local 
purposes or imposed by the colonial General Court. 
The selectmen also collected the taxes, ordered the pay- 
ment of bills, and acted as treasurers of the public money. 
There was a town clerk, who kept the town records, re- 
corded the proceedings of town meetings, and kept careful 
accounts of the receipts and expenditures of public money. 
There was a constable to arrest offenders; a justice of the 
peace to try them; a pound keeper to take all stray 
cattle or horses and put them into safe enclosures; and 
still another officer was a hog-reeve to take up and 
impound stray swine. All of these town officials were 
elected annually for the term of one year. 1 

1 The one feature that marred the democracy of the early town meeting 
was the fact that the right of suffrage was restricted to freemen, and no 
man was made a freeman by the general court unless he could prove 
himself to be a member of some Congregational church, sound on all the 
essential points of the Calvanistic Puritan creed. In itself, each little 
Congregational church was an independent organization that managed its 
own affairs. Each church elected its own minister by vote of its church 
members and dismissed him in the same manner. In the beginning, when 
there was only one church in a small town, the minister was elected in 
town meeting and paid out of the town treasury. It was hard to draw a 
dividing line between town and church. 



14 GENESIS OF AMERICAN COMMON SCHOOLS 

Such was the civil government of the colony of Massa- 
chusetts Bay, which in the course of time developed into 
a representative form of state government. 

Turning now from civil government to educational be- 
ginnings in the new colony, we find, as we might expect, 
that these recently transplanted Englishmen modeled their 
early schools after the grammar schools of the mother 
country. The Boston Latin School (1635) was started 
by a subscription list headed by Sir Henry Vane and Gov- 
ernor John Winthrop, but was soon placed under the 
control of the town selectmen, and thereafter the school 
was mainly supported by town appropriations. Into this 
school there entered about a dozen boys who were ad- 
mitted on the sole condition that they could "read the 
English language," in other words, at about seven years of 
age. The curriculum was limited exclusively to Latin sup- 
plemented by a little Greek. At thirteen or fourteen years 
of age the boys were turned out fitted for college. In 
1636, one year after the Boston Latin School was "set 
up," the General Court of the Bay colonies appropriated 
four hundred pounds ($2000) toward the establishment of 
a college at Newtown (now Cambridge). 

At various intervals during the following decade, gram- 
mar schools were set up in Charlestown, Dorchester, 
Salem, Ipswich, Cambridge, Dedham, and Newbury in Mas- 
sachusetts, at New Haven and Hartford in Connecticut, 
and at Newport in Rhode Island. These schools were 
taught exclusively by men and were attended exclusively 
by boys. Their primary purpose was to fit boys for col- 
lege. The major study was Latin, combined with a little 
Greek. Boys were admitted into the grammar schools 
at about seven years of age, provided they could read 



THE EARLY GRAMMAR SCHOOLS 15 

readily in English, which accomplishment it was taken for 
granted they had acquired at home or in small private 
schools known as " women's schools," or "dame schools. " 

The earlier grammar schools were supported partly by 
tuition fees, partly by town appropriations, partly by 
gifts, bequests, or endowments. In course of time, it was 
found that many parents did not desire their boys to study 
Latin; and reading in English, spelling, writing, and arith- 
metic were taken as a substitute, so that only a small 
minority of the pupils remained in the Latin course. Even- 
tually Latin grammar was superseded by English gram- 
mar, and little of the original grammar school was left, 
except the name, which is still applied to the upper grades 
of the modern elementary graded school. 

The conservative town of Boston finally came into line, 
and in 1682 voted in town meeting "that a committee 
with the selectmen consider and provide for the teaching 
of children to write and cipher within this town." Several 
grammar schools were opened, with one department for 
teaching writing and ciphering under one master, and 
the other department under another master, for teaching 
reading and spelling. Into these new English grammar 
schools boys were admitted at about seven years of age, 
or when they could "read the English language by spelling 
the same." It was one of these double-headed schools 
that Benjamin Franklin entered when an eight- year-old 
boy, remaining in it less than two years, which period 
included all the schooling he ever got. In Franklin's 
autobiography he says of himself, "I learned a good 
handwriting, but failed in arithmetic." Franklin's real 
education was gained in a printing office. 

It seemed a matter of course that girls should remain 



1 6 GENESIS OF AMERICAN COMMON SCHOOLS 

illiterate, or else must learn to read and write, as in Eng- 
land, in the little private schools known as "dame schools" 
or "women's schools," in which the tuition fees were a 
penny a day. 

Meanwhile, in 1642, the General Court of the Bay 
colony passed an act reading as follows: 

" Forasmuch as good education is of singular behoof and benefit to any 
Commonwealth, it is ordered that the selectmen of every town have a 
vigilant eye over their brethren and neighbors to see first: That none of 
them shall suffer so much barbarism in any of their families as not to teach 
by themselves, or 1 others, their children and apprentices, so much learning 
as may enable them perfectly to read the English tongue, upon penalty 
of twenty shillings for each neglect therein." 

This law does not seem to have been strictly enforced, 
but it served as a legal encouragement to the common 
people to "set up" small schools. 

Five years later (1647) the General Court ordered: 
"that when a town had increased to the number of fifty 
house-holders, it should then forthwith appoint one within 
their town to teach all such children as shall resort to him 
to write and read, whose wages shall be paid either by 
the parents or the masters of such children, or by the 
inhabitants in general by way of supply, as the major 
part of those that order the prudentials of the town shall 
appoint;" and it was further ordered that "where any 
town shall increase to the number of one hundred families 
or house-holders, they shall set up a grammar school, the 
master thereof being able to instruct youths so far as 
they may be fitted for the university." Three years later 
the Connecticut colony passed a law similar in the main 
to that of Massachusetts. 

The provision for the setting up of grammar schools 
seems to have been enforced by the magistrates, but the 



SCHOOLS IN RURAL DISTRICTS 17 

matter of the smaller schools for teaching little children 
to write and read was, in general, left to the initiative 
of the common people themselves. 

Common Schools in Rural Districts 

It is in the records of settlements later than those at the 
seaports of Boston and Salem that we discover, in embryo, 
schools differing in type from the schools of old England. 
In these rural towns of small farms, after the settlers 
had made a clearing in the forest, they organized a town 
government, built a meeting-house, and in town meeting 
voted to hire a minister to preach the gospel. Then, in 
a few years, they voted in town meeting to build a school- 
house and hire a man to teach a school to which all the 
children of the town, without limitation of age or sex, were 
admitted. Coeducation of the sexes was a necessity, not 
a theory. There was no printed course of study, but 
by custom the essential studies were reading, spelling, 
writing, and arithmetic. These sturdy freemen had a 
solemn conviction that their children ought to be able to 
read and write their mother tongue so that they could 
read the Scriptures and the church catechism. As a matter 
of business, they ought to know enough of arithmetic "to 
cast accounts." Such a school was the Hampton school 
of 1649, previously mentioned, which has an authenticated 
history in the original records of town meetings. 

These primitive schools were sometimes supported by 
subscriptions, but were soon maintained by a tax voted in 
town meeting, sufficient to keep them open from three to 
five months in the year. These "common schools" of the 
plain people were not charity schools for the children of 
the poor. They were wholly unlike the endowed grammar 



1 8 GENESIS OF AMERICAN COMMON SCHOOLS 

schools of England, established for the higher classes. 
Whether these schools were good or whether they were 
poor depended almost entirely on the character of the 
schoolmaster or the temper of the people. Some of the early 
schoolmasters were college-bred men from over the sea, 
who, "finding themselves unfitted for the hard work of 
clearing woodlands or building stone walls, took to school- 
teaching. Such teachers were not limited to the custo- 
mary studies of reading, writing, and arithmetic. As a 
matter of fact, they often helped along the big boys, who 
went to school during the long winters, in English grammar, 
or algebra, or even in Latin. Along the seacoast, at a 
later period, these teachers let the most promising boys 
worry their brains over Pike's Arithmetic, which included 
algebra through quadratic equations, and geometry through 
conic sections. 1 

1 Such a teacher was John Sullivan, a scholarly Catholic Irish gentleman 
who came over to New England in 1723. After he had gained a foothold, 
twelve years later, he married Margery Brown, who, as a little girl seven 
years old, came over on the same vessel that brought John Sullivan. Shortly 
after their marriage, Schoolmaster Sullivan bought a small farm in Ber- 
wick, Maine, and continued teaching school in Berwick, and in Somers- 
worth, New Hampshire. He spoke French fluently and taught Latin well. 
He seems also to have served incidentally as a lawyer in drawing wills and 
making out deeds and other legal papers. He taught school until he was 
ninety years old, and died on his farm in Berwick at the age of one hundred 
and four years. 

The children of John Sullivan and Margery Brown seem to have in- 
herited strong traits of character from both father and mother. Their son, 
John Sullivan, born in 1740, and educated in schools taught by his father, 
became a notable figure in the history of New Hampshire, as lawyer, jurist, 
and Major General in the Revolution. Another son, James Sullivan, born 
in 1744, became a lawyer, a jurist, and a governor of Massachusetts. One 
of Schoolmaster Sujli van's grandsons became governor of Maine; another, 
a senator from New Hampshire, and a third, lieutenant governor of Illinois. 
Schoolmaster Sullivan was a teacher who honered his profession. 



SCHOOLS AND THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION 1 9 

It must be borne in mind by the student of educa- 
tional history that in colonial times each little common 
school was a social center hardly second to that of the 
church. In the rural districts there were no daily papers, 
and the few weekly sheets in circulation were passed from 
hand to hand among a hardy yeomanry. There were no 
public libraries. Books were costly, and the majority of 
the farmers could not afford to buy them. To many 
families the Bible, the annual almanac, the New England 
Primer, and a few schoolbooks furnished their only read- 
ing matter. During the long cold winters when there was 
little farm work to be done, both boys and girls attended 
school up to the age of eighteen years. Along the sea- 
coast the older boys were engaged during the summer 
months in fishing for cod on the "grand banks," or along 
the coast for mackerel. Having no work to do in winter, 
they went to school, studied arithmetic, and possibly 
navigation, if the young schoolmasters from Harvard or 
Dartmouth were competent to teach that branch of prac- 
tical mathematics. These overgrown vikings of the sea- 
coast were hard to govern, and the school committee 
preferred to employ robust athletes that could hold their 
own in a rough-and-tumble attack of the big boys to put 
the master out of the schoolhouse. 

One of the Concord school of philosophers, Mr. F. B. 
Sanborn, born in the historic town of Hampton, N. H., 
said in a recent address, that "if there had been no com- 
mon schools in New England, there would have been no 
American Revolution.' After the preliminary skirmish of 
Lexington, the hardy yeomanry of New England, who had 
been drilled in the common schools, promptly answered the 
call to arms and fought the battle of Bunker Hill. The 



20 GENESIS OF AMERICAN COMMON SCHOOLS 

strong-armed fishermen of Marblehead, Cape Ann, and 
Cape Cod volunteered in the militia or manned the numer- 
ous and daring privateers that were fitted out to prey on 
British merchant vessels. It was these hardy mariners 
who manned the boats which safely ferried Washington 
and his army across East River in the skillfully conducted 
retreat after the battle of Long Island. These same 
sailors and fishermen tugged at the oars of boats filled 
with "ragged Continentals" amid the floating ice of the 
Delaware, in the darkness of a stormy winter night, when 
Washington made his brilliant attack on the Hessians at 
Trenton. The right wing of that little army was com- 
manded by General John Sullivan of New Hampshire, and 
the advance guard was led by General John Stark of the 
same state. 

The Declaration of Independence, the long war with 
the mother country, and finally the adoption of the Con- 
stitution of the United States, led to a revision of state 
constitutions, of state laws, and of school laws. The 
veterans who had served through the war or fought in the 
ranks of the militia claimed their civil rights and in part 
got them. The right of suffrage was greatly extended by 
the relaxation of religious tests and by a reduction of 
property qualifications. Vermont in New England, and 
Kentucky in the West, were the pioneer states in establish- 
ing manhood suffrage, limited only by the age of twenty- 
one years. The new nation had, in some measure, cut 
loose from British precedents in state, in church, and in 
schools. 

It was in 1789 that girls were admitted tentatively into 
the " English grammar schools of Boston town" by allow- 
ing them to go to school at the noon intermission when 



SCHOOL DISTRICTS 21 

the boys were absent from the schoolrooms, and on 
Thursday afternoons when the boys had a half holiday; 
but no provision had yet been made for teaching either 
boys or girls to read their mother tongue. 

It was in 1789 that the legislature of Massachusetts 
enacted a law providing that towns could be subdivided 
into school districts. This law further provided that the 
course of study should include at least reading, writing, 
spelling, arithmetic, and "decent behavior." Opposition 
of the common people to the compulsory maintenance of 
the old-time Latin grammar schools had by this time 
become strong enough to secure in the law a provision 
that no town of less than two hundred families should be 
" required to maintain a grammar school." 

This law of 1789 was amended eleven years later (1800) 
by empowering school districts to hold district meetings 
and to levy district taxes for building schoolhouses. In 
181 7 school districts were made "corporate bodies." In > 
1827 the law was amended so as to provide that towns 
having school districts should "choose for each district a 
'prudential committeman' to look after the school and 
appoint the teacher." At this time geography was added 
to the list of school studies. 1 

About this time the voters in Boston assumed the 
initiative in town meeting (18 18) by electing a committee 
"to establish and control primary schools for children 
under seven years of age." As a result, during the fol- 
lowing year, twenty schools were opened, eleven hundred 
boys and girls were enrolled, and women were appointed 
as teachers. The Boston "primary schools" were opened 

1 See George H. Martin's " Evolution of the Massachusetts Public 
School System," D. Appleton & Co., 1894. 



22 GENESIS OF AMERICAN COMMON SCHOOLS 

one hundred and eighty-four years after the Boston Latin 
School was established. 

This Massachusetts school law was so flexible and so 
democratic that it was suited both to the temper of the 
people and to the conditions of pioneer life. The school 
district became a small political unit in which the common 
people reigned supreme. The initiative in school matters 
must be taken by the people themselves. Other New 
England states followed the lead of Massachusetts. The 
state of New York enacted similar laws, modified by 
making the county, instead of the township, the political 
unit, and by providing for three school trustees in each 
school district. The New York law, in substance, was 
enacted by Ohio, Illinois, Indiana, and other states in the 
northwest. Still later, the main outlines of the New York 
law were taken as a basis of the law in California, in which 
state every rural schoolhouse has been built by a school- 
district tax, voted, not under compulsion, but on the 
initiative of the people assembled in school-district meet- 
ings. This law of 1789, with its long line of amendments, 
established the district common schools as they existed in 
1835 when I began to go to school at five years of age 
in the town of Pittsfield in New Hampshire. 

The Latin grammar schools and the early district 
schools have been the subjects of undue laudation on the 
one hand, and of unmerited criticism on the other. The 
fact is, that in the formative period the private schools, 
the denominational schools, the dame schools, and the 
common schools all were suited to the religious, the social, 
and the industrial conditions of the time in which they 
flourished, and they all contributed something towards 
the elementary education of the people. They must be 



ADAPTABILITY TO PUBLIC NEEDS 23 

judged by the conditions of the seventeenth and eighteenth 
centuries, not by the standard of the twentieth century. 
The early public schools were organized by the plain com- 
mon people assembled in town meeting. In their formative 
period they owed little to speculative philosophers or to 
denominational institutions. With every extension of the 
right of suffrage they grew stronger, keeping even pace 
with the progress of civilization, with the broader recog- 
nition of the rights of man, and with the increase in wealth 
and population. 



CHAPTER II 

MY NEW ENGLAND ENVIRONMENT 

In the central part of New Hampshire, about fifteen miles 
south of Lake Winnepesaukee, among the foothills of the 
White Mountains, lies the picturesque town of Pittsfield in 
which were born my father, my mother, and myself. My 
native town is small in area, containing only eighteen square 
miles. It forms a part of Merrimac County, which includes 
a section of the valley of the Merrimac River on which are 
situated Manchester, the chief city of the state,- and Con- 
cord, the capital. The early settlers were attracted to this 
hill region by its fine forests of oak, maple, white pine, 
hemlock and birch, and by the water power of the Suncook 
River, a branch of the Merrimac. Near the center of the 
town rises the long granite ridge of Catamount, shaggy 
with brush and trees, to a height of 1200 feet above sea 
level. The stony soil on the hills and rolling swells of 
glacial moraines was hard to clear, but, when subdued, 
was fairly productive. For more than half a century 
lumbering was an important source of profit. The tall 
white pines were cut and hauled in winter to tide water, 
a distance of about thirty miles, and sold for masts and 
ship timber. 

One of the early settlers in Pittsfield, John Cram of 
Hampton, bought a large tract of woodland and built a 
small sawmill on the falls of the Suncook River, around 
which was clustered, in a few years, a thriving little village. 

24 



EARLY DAYS IN PITTSFIELD 25 

The sawmill was followed by a gristmill, a fulling mill, 
and at a later period by a cotton mill. 

Most of the early settlers of Pittsfield came from the 
town of Hampton, which seems to have been the hive that 
sent out swarms of hardy pioneers into the wilderness of 
central New Hampshire soon, after the close of the French 
and Indian War, when there was no longer danger from the 
incursions of savage foes. 

Among these men in search of cheap land for home- 
steads were my grandfathers, Thomas Rogers Swett and 
Abraham French, and my great-grandfather on the mater- 
nalside, David Knowlton. In the early Pittsfield town 
records there are found many family names, all English, 
that appear in the still earlier Hampton records; such 
as Batchelder, Brown, Blake, Berry, Cram, Drake, Dow, 
Dearborn, French, Garland, Green, Jenness, Lane, Leavitt, 
Marston, Norris, Page, Perkins, Prescott, Swett, Smith, 
Sanborn, Tilton, and Towle. The names of small towns 
in southern New Hampshire, settled largely by emigrants 
from Hampton, show unmistakably that the early settlers 
came originally from the southwestern shires of the mother 
country over the sea, and they read like an extract from a 
geographical gazetteer of old England: " Hampton, Dover, 
Portsmouth, Exeter, Stratham, Epping, Nottingham, Salis- 
bury, Durham, Epsom, Chichester, Canterbury, Pembroke, 
Newmarket; and crossing the line into Massachusetts, 
"Newbury," Ipswich, Essex, Gloucester, Marblehead, 
Boston, Plymouth, Yarmouth," etc. 

Turning to the town records of Pittsfield, I find that 
in 1772 it was voted "to build a meeting-house of 
the same bigness of Hampton Falls meeting-house," 
and "to raise some money this year for preaching"; 



26 MY NEW ENGLAND ENVIRONMENT 

also "to hire Jonathan Brown to teach a school six 
months at nine dollars a month." Presently the town 
built a schoolhouse which, like the meeting house, was 
"of the same bigness" as the schoolhouse at Hampton 
Falls. 

Now the town of Hampton, bordering on the seacoast 
and also on the Massachusetts line, is notable in the early 
annals of common schools. It was settled in 1632 by 
"liberal" Puritans from Boston, Salem, and the surround- 
ing towns of Massachusetts Bay, who pushed out into 
the province of New Hampshire, some of them in search 
of cheap land for homesteads, and a few of them under 
compulsion on account of holding "various heretical 
doctrines." The Hampton town records "on the 2 of the 
2 month, 1649," show that the "selectmen" made an 
agreement with John Legat "to teach and instruct all the 
children of or belonging to our Towne both mayle and 
femaile (wch are capable of learning) to write and read and 
cast accounts (if it be desired) as diligently and carefully 
as he is able to teach and instruct them, and in consider- 
ation thereof we have agreed to pay or cause to be payd 
to the said John Legat the sum of Twenty pounds, in corn, 
cattle, or butter att price current." 1 At the time of this 
contract, Hampton was under the jurisdiction of Massa- 
chusetts. 

A few years later the town records of Hampton show 
that a property tax was ordered in^own meeting for the 
support of this school. Still later, when the population 
had increased, a "Latin grammar school" was ordered by 
vote in town meeting as a supplement to the "common 

1 History of the Town of Hampton, by Joseph Dow. 1893. Salem, Mass, 
Printed by the Salem Press Publishing and Printing Company, 



JOHN WHEELWRIGHT 27 

school." This school was taught for half a century by 
various graduates of Harvard College, many of whom were 
clergymen. When the age of academies began to dawn 
Hampton Academy was founded in 1810. 

After an extended examination of town histories and 
records it is evident to me that the town of Hampton can 
fairly claim the honor of beginning in New England one 
of the first typical colonial common schools, which placed 
all children, boys and girls alike, on a common footing 
of equal rights to an education in reading, writing, and 
arithmetic. When the succeeding generations in Hampton 
pushed out into the border wilderness of New Hampshire 
and Maine to found new settlements, they followed the 
example of the mother town, and this was why the schools 
of my native town provided from the beginning for the 
coeducation of the sexes and for the teaching of reading, 
writing, and arithmetic. 

The historical records of New Hampshire show how it 
came about that this feeble rural settlement opened the 
doors of its first school in 1649 to "all the children of or 
belonging to our Towne, both mayle and femaile." It 
seems that Rev. John Wheelwright of Lincolnshire, Eng- 
land, landed in Boston, May 26, 1636, and was admitted 
to church membership in that town in June following. 
Now, John Wheelwright was a brother-in-law of Mrs. Anne 
Hutchinson, and this fact placed him under the suspicion 
of holding Antinomian doctrines, and he thought best 
to remove to Mount Wollaston (now Quincy), where he 
became pastor of a church. But he soon preached a 
" fast-day sermon" for which he was called a into Court" 
and adjudged guilty of "sedition and contempt." At the 
next meeting of the General Court nine months later, 



28 MY NEW ENGLAND ENVIRONMENT 

Mr. Wheelwright was disfranchised and banished" and 
ordered to leave the jurisdiction of the Court within four- 
teen days. So he departed with some of his church mem- 
bers and formed a new settlement at Squamscott (now 
Exeter) in New Hampshire, and became pastor of a new 
church (1638). But in 1642 the people of Exeter and 
Hampton placed themselves under the jurisdiction of 
Massachusetts, and Mr. Wheelwright was forced to remove 
to Wells, in the province of Maine, whither he was followed 
by many of his church members. Finally, in 1654, the 
people of Hampton presented a petition to the General 
Court praying that the sentence of banishment be no 
longer enforced. The request was granted, though indi- 
rectly and with much circumlocution. 

Furthermore, the first pastor in the town of Hampton was 
the Reverend Stephen Bachiler, a liberal Puritan, who in 
1632 had settled at Lynn. On account of his zeal for pop- 
ular rights he was soon suspended from the ministry, and 
ordered to depart from the town. In 1638 he became pastor 
of the small church at Hampton. In fact, many of the 
original settlers of Hampton moved away from Boston 
and Salem because the right of suffrage in those early 
theocracies was strictly limited to members of the Con- 
gregational church. Among other occasional visitors to the 
liberals in Exeter and Hampton there was the notable 
dissenter, Mrs. Anne Hutchinson, known among the strict 
constructionists of that day -as a " theological fire-brand." 
In the days of Ralph Waldo Emerson, Mrs. Hutchinson 
would have been classed among the transcendentalists. 
The "liberals" were numerous in Hampton, which fact 
probably accounts for the admission of girls into their first 
common school. It is worthy of note, also, that in Hamp- 



MY PURITAN ANCESTRY 20, 

ton, from the beginning, there was no religious limitation 
of the right of suffrage. 1 

It was in the common schools of Hampton that four 
generations of my ancestors received their scanty educa- 
tion. In a town settled almost exclusively by Puritan 
emigrants from Hampton, my father and mother attended 
district schools like those of the mother town. It was in 
such schools that my father was for several years a teacher. 
It was in one of the old-time district schoolhouses that I 
was introduced at five years of age to- Noah Webster's 
spelling book. Furthermore, following my father's ex- 
ample, I became a teacher in the district schools of New 
Hampshire and Massachusetts /for four winter terms, 
during the time when I was working my way through an 
academic education. 

My Puritan Ancestry 

My ancestry, so far as I can definitely trace it, runs 
back to the records of the General Court of the Massa- 

1 The far-reaching impulse of this Hampton primitive common school 
is illustrated in the education of Daniel Webster, whose father, Captain 
Ebenezer Webster, was a lineal descendant of Thomas Webster, who settled 
in Hampton in 1636. Captain Ebenezer Webster was a hardy farmer, 
Indian fighter, and pioneer who, after the close of the French and Indian 
Wars, pushed his way from Kingston to the utmost verge of civilization in 
the province of New Hampshire, and built a log house in the town of 
Salisbury. He was a leader in town affairs, and in due time he and his 
neighbors started a common school similar to the typical Hampton school. 
In order to accommodate the sparse and scattered population, this school 
was held in three different parts of the town, under the same schoolmaster. 
Ebenezer Webster was bent on giving his youngest son, Daniel, the best possi- 
ble education, and so the boy followed Master Thomas Chase, and afterwards 
Master James Tappan, from school to school, sometimes traveling several 
miles, and sometimes put to board with some farmer nearer the school- 
house. It was schoolmaster Tappan who discovered talent in the boy 
Daniel, and who urged his father to send him to Dartmouth College. 



SO MY NEW ENGLAND ENVIRONMENT 

chusetts Bay Colony, which shows that John Swett, of 
Devonshire, England, was admitted to the freedom of the 
Colony, May 18, 1642. 1 

John Swett, Nathaniel Weare, and eighty-nine other 
freemen were granted tracts of land in the town of 
Newbury, Massachusetts, on the seacoast near the New 
Hampshire line. To this land grant, made December 7, 
1642, the colonists immediately repaired. Savage's Genea- 
logical Dictionary says that "John Swett of Newbury 
brought with him from England his sons, Stephen, Benja- 
min, and Joseph, and perhaps others." 

Benjamin Swett married Hester, daughter of Nathaniel 
Weare, Senior, and in 1663 removed with his brother-in- 
law, Nathaniel Weare, Junior, to Hampton, and settled 

1 John Fiske, in his " Beginnings of New England," makes a rough esti- 
mate that about one-sixth of the Puritan influx to New England came from 
the southwest seacoast counties of England, viz. : Devonshire, Dorset, and 
Somerset. Of the people of Devonshire, Woodrow Wilson, the historian, 
writes : 

" For a time, all that was most characteristic of adventurous and sea- 
loving England was centered in Devonshire. . . . Devonshire lies in the midst 
of that group of counties in the southwest of England in which the Saxon 
mastery did least to destroy or drive out the old Celtic population. There 
is accordingly a strong strain of Celtic blood among its people to this day, 
and the land suits with the strain." . . . 

" For itself, Devonshire had the great harbor and roads of Plymouth, 
and innumerable fishing ports, where a whole race of venturesome and 
hardy fishermen were nurtured. All the great sea names of the Elizabethan 
age belong to it. Drake, Hawkins, Raleigh, and the Gilberts were all 
Devonshire men; and it was from Plymouth that the first fleet went out 
which beat the great Armada on its way to shipwreck in the north. The 
men who first undertook to colonize the New World for England were bred 
to adventure, both by books and by the sea air in which they lived. " New 
England Genealogical and Antiquarian Register, 1852. Vol. VI. p. 49-62. 
"The Swett Family." Also Savage's Genealogical Dictionary of the First 
Settlers of New England, p. 240. Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1862. 



CAPTAIN BENJAMIN SWETT 3 1 

on the " Falls Side." They both grew to be men of 
affairs. 

Mr. Swett was chosen selectman and commissioner of 
county rates, but his chief service was in drilling the 
militia and in fighting Indians. He was successively 
elected ensign, lieutenant, and chaplain. In June, 1677, 
he was made commander of an expedition against the 
Indians in the province of Maine. This force, consisting 
of ninety men aided by two hundred friendly Natick 
Indians, landed at Black Point in Scarborough, where 
there was a fortified garrison Captain Swett and Lieu- 
tenant Richardson moved out of the fort to attack 
the enemy, but fell into an ambuscade prepared by 
the wily foe. The friendly Indians stampeded, and the 
whites, fighting bravely, retreated to the garrison house. 
Lieutenant Richardson was killed early in the fight. 
" Captain Swett," says Williamson's History of Maine, 
"fought the enemy hand to hand, displaying upon the 
spot and on the retreat of two miles, great presence of 
mind as well as personal courage in repeated rallies of his 
men, in his exertions to bring off the dead and wounded, 
and in defense of his rear, upon which the savages hung 
with destructive fury. At last, wounded in twenty places, 
exhausted by fatigue and loss of blood, he was grabbed 
and thrown to the ground and barbarously hacked to 
pieces at the gate of the garrison. With this intrepid 
officer fell sixty of his men, forty English and twenty 
Indians." 

Captain Benjamin Swett left a family of eleven chil- 
dren, — five boys and six girls. His widow married a Mr. 
Greenleaf of Newbury and took with her to that town the 
younger children, leaving in Hampton the four older sons, 



32 MY NEW ENGLAND ENVIRONMENT 

— Benjamin, John, Joseph, and Moses. Joseph, the most 
notable of these, took an active part in town affairs, and 
was elected representative to the Provincial Assembly 
(1708). He had a family of eight children, three of whom 
were sons, — Benjamin, Nathan, and Moses. His eldest 
son, Benjamin, born in 17 10, married a daughter of Bonus 
Norton of Ipswich, and had three children, — Stephen, 
Sarah, and Thomas Rogers. This youngest child, Thomas 
Rogers Swett, only three years old when his father died, 
was put out at an early age as an apprentice to learn the 
trade of fuller and clothier. He learned " to read and 
write and cipher n in the common school at Hampton 
Falls. When sixteen years of age, he enlisted as a private 
in the New Hampshire quota of militia, called out in 
what was known as the " Rhode Island campaign." 
Though two years under the legal age of eighteen, he was 
enrolled, June 26, 1777, under the name of Thomas Swett, 
omitting Rogers, his middle name, in Captain Joseph 
Parson's company, Colonel Joseph Senter's New Hamp- 
shire regiment, and was mustered out with the regiment 
in January, 1779. In his old age he was placed on the 
Revolutionary pension roll of New Hampshire. After his 
discharge from the army he worked for several years at 
his trade, and then settled in Pittsfield, N. H., where he 
built a fulling mill on the Suncook Falls. 

When his mill was swept away by the "great flood," he 
traded the mill site for the Drake farm on the edge of 
Pittsfield village. He was engaged at times in buying 
beef cattle in New Hampshire, and selling them in the 
Boston market. He had a family of ten children, — two 
by his first wife, Abigail Cram, who died in 1789, and eight 
by his second wife, Betsey Knowlton. All these, six sons 



MY MATERNAL ANCESTORS 33 

and four daughters, were educated in the common schools. 
All grew up to maturity, were married, and had children. 

The names of this large family run as follows, in order of 
birth: — By his first wife : Eunice, 1787, and John, 1789; by 
his second wife: Moses, 1792; David, 1794; Thomas 
Rogers, Junior, 1797; Eben, 1799; Daniel, 1802; Mary, 
1805; Betsey, 1807; and Sarah, 1809. Eben Swett, the 
fifth son, was my father. 

Few of the Swett family became wealthy, but in the 
hard struggle to earn a living in early days they all man- 
aged to keep their heads above water. Though of direct 
Puritan descent, they had a marked tendency to liberal 
ideas. Samuel Swett of Boston, a lineal descendant of 
John Swett of Newbury, published a "History of Bunker 
Hill Battle," and various other historical documents. 
Leonard Swett, born in Turner, Maine (1825), was a 
grandson of John Swett of Buckfield, Maine, and great- 
grandson of Dr. Stephen Swett, who settled in Gorham in 
1770. He went west and became, in Illinois, the most 
notable lawyer and politician that appears in the records 
of the Swett family. Sophie Miriam Swett and her 
sister, Susan Hartley Swett, of the Swett family that 
settled in Maine, are known as authors and magazine con- 
tributors. The mother of Frank Swett Black, governor 
of New York in 1897-98, was daughter of my uncle, 
Moses Swett, of Hollis, Maine. 

My maternal grandfather, Abraham French, was born 
in Stratham, near Hampton Falls, in 1758. Abraham was 
left fatherless at the age of seven years, and his mother 
with six young children had a hard struggle to support 
them. He was apprenticed at an early age to learn the 
trade of joiner and cabinet maker, but he attended the 



34 MY NEW ENGLAND ENVIRONMENT 

common school in Hampton Falls during the winter terms, 
and learned ' l to read and write and cast accounts." When 
the large meetinghouse, erected by vote of the town of 
Pittsfield, was nearing completion, he was sent for to do 
the finishing work of the interior. He packed his tools on 
his back and traveled the whole distance on foot. He 
liked the town so well that he bought a farm on the edge 
of Pittsfield village, married Hannah Lane (1795), and 
settled down for life. The house on this farm was built 
as a parsonage for Christopher Paige, a minister of the 
Congregational church. In this house my grandfather 
and his wife reared a family of eleven children and sent 
them to the common school to be educated. The fifth 
child of this family, Lucretia French, was my mother. 

My grandfather French was a shrewd man of business, 
who carried on his farm, ran a sawmill, dealt in lumber, 
and managed a carpenter shop for making furniture and 
the cases of old-fashioned stately eight-day clocks. I re- 
member him as a genial old man, who had a keen sense of 
humor, who smoked his pipe, drank his mug of cider, and 
took cheerful views of temporal affairs, notwithstanding 
the severe Calvinism of his religious creed. It was in his 
workshop that I learned to use a lathe, on which I turned 
my own tops when a boy. He died in 1850, aged eighty- two 
years. 

My grandmother French, I remember as a venerable 
old lady, small in stature, nervous in temperament, and 
skilled in housekeeping. She delighted in reading the 
Bible, Scott's Commentaries, and various volumes of theo- 
logical sermons. She was a devoted member of the Con- 
gregational church and regularly attended its meetings, 
while her husband as regularly went to the Calvin-Baptist 



EEENEZER LANE AND DAVID KNOWLTON 35 

church; yet there was no discord in the family on that 
account, for each was tolerant of the other, and both 
made their faith evident in good works. She visited my 
bedside once when I was a small boy, sick with a fever, 
and talked very kindly to me. She said: 'You must 
not be afraid to die. Life is a vale of tears, and those 
who die young are better off than those who live to 
be old." I remember that I thought I wanted to get 
well and would rather take the chances. The Lane family 
records show a long list of substantial farmers, mechanics, 
tradesmen, long-lived and thrifty; also a few teachers, 
several ministers, and a large number of Congregational 
deacons. 

My grandmother's brother, Ebenezer Lane, who settled 
in Pittsfield at an early date, was a teacher, a farmer, and 
a surveyor, educated in Phillips-Exeter Academy. He 
was elected to various town offices, was sent to the state 
legislature, and was a man of marked ability and char- 
acter. After his death, when his personal property was 
sold at auction, I "bid in" his surveyor's compass, chain, 
and other instruments, and with this outfit surveyed 
and plotted the Swett farm. My strong liking for trigo- 
nometry and surveying, when at school, was perhaps 
owing to a thread of heredity running back through my 
grandmother to the Lane family. 

David Knowlton, one of the early settlers that came 
from Seabrook near Hampton, was by trade a blacksmith 
and farmer, and by "profession" an elder in the Freewill 
Baptist church. He bought a tract of woodland, high up 
on the slope of Catamount, cleared it, and built a farm- 

1 Lane Genealogies, Vol. I, by Rev. Jacob Chapman, Exeter, N. H., 
News Letter Press 1891. 



36 MY NEW ENGLAND ENVIRONMENT 

house. Then he organized a Freewill Baptist church of 
six members, built a small meeting house on one corner of 
his farm, and was ordained as a preacher of the gospel. 
He preached to that mountain congregation for more than 
twenty years, refusing any salary, and supporting his 
family by the work of his own hands in his blacksmith 
shop and on his rocky little farm. He is described as a 
man of powerful physique and commanding presence. He 
was not college bred, but was endowed by nature with the 
gift of public speaking and with a religious enthusiasm 
that never nagged. He died in 1815, at seventy-four 
years of age. His wife, Mary (Green) Knowlton, died 
three years later, at seventy-four years of age, and was 
buried by his side in the small church burial ground near 
the old Quaker burial ground on Catamount. 

Elder Knowlton had ten children, only five of whom 
lived to maturity and were married. His two sons, 
Ebenezer and David, became Freewill Baptist preachers of 
marked ability. His daughter, Betsey, married Thomas 
Rogers Swett, my grandfather. 

Betsey Knowlton grew up under strong religious influ- 
ences, and made her fervent piety manifest in training a 
large family of boys and girls in the way they should go, 
so well that when they grew up they did not depart from it. 
My grandmother inherited intellectual ability and an emo- 
tional temperament, traits which she transmitted to one of 
her sons, Eben, and to her three daughters. When she was 
married to my grandfather in 1791, at twenty-one years 
of age, she became stepmother to two children, — Eunice, 
four years old, and John, two years old, — whom she cared 
for as lovingly as for her own five sons and three daughters. 
She lived to see all of her children grow to manhood and 



GRANDFATHER SWETT 37 

womanhood; she saw them well married and settled in 
life; and then, somewhat broken with the care of a large 
family and the domestic duties of a farmer's wife, she 
rested from cooking, spinning, weaving, and knitting, 
folded her worn hands, and passed peacefully away in the 
seventieth year of her age. I was ten years old when I 
sadly followed with the mourners and saw her body laid 
to rest in the grave. I have always cherished her mem- 
ory, and I am glad in my old age to pay this humble 
tribute to my*grandmother, Betsey (Knowlton) Swett. 

My grandfather Swett I remember as a stirring old 
man, quick in temper, small in stature, with a full head 
of flowing white hair. He still had in the house the heavy 
old flintlock " queen's arms" musket that he had shoul- 
dered in the army. He was rather an aggressive man, 
fearless, independent, and a stubborn disbeliever in devils, 
witches, ghosts, and other current superstitions of his time. 

I distinctly recall a discussion between him and his 
brother Stephen, which I overheard when I was eight or 
nine years old. My grandfather stoutly defended his 
Universalist belief until his brother, a rigid Calvinist, 
turned to him and said, ''Well, I would not trust the 
salvation of my soul on any such flimsy platform as you 
stand upon." My boyish sympathies ran with my grand- 
father. I remember, too, that he liked to have some one 
read to him from "The Trumpet," the Universalist weekly 
paper, and when something pleased him he would exclaim, 
" That's God's truth." He died in 1847, at the advanced 
age of eighty-eight years. His grave in the village burial 
ground near the town hall is marked by a headstone re- 
cently placed there by one of his grandsons, bearing the 
inscription, u A Soldier of the Revolution." 



CHAPTER III 

MY BOYHOOD HOME, EARLY SCHOOL DAYS, AND THE AGE 

OF HOMESPUN 

The New England farmhouse which was once my home 
is yet standing on what was long known as the Drake- 
Swett homestead. The eastern boundary of this farm is 
the Suncook River, which washes the base of Catamount. 
The house commands a view of Pittsfield village; of 
Mt. Kearsarge, rising blue in the western horizon; and of 
the "Ossipee hills," that stand like granite sentinels guard- 
ing Lake Winnepesaukee, that beautiful sheet of water 
which the Indians rightly named the " Smile of the Great 
Spirit." 

Near the close of the eighteenth century Simeon Drake 
bought a tract of heavily wooded land on the edge of 
Pittsfield village, and built on a little eminence a spa- 
cious two-story house, a barn, and other outbuildings. 
Then he made a clearing for a farm on the lateral moraine 
of a glacier that, ages before, had moved slowly down 
what is now the channel of Suncook River, grinding granite 
into soil, and mixing it up with cobblestones and bowlders 
of all sizes. The heavy stone walls still remain as monu- 
ments of the hard labor by which the land was brought 
under cultivation. 

My grandfather, Thomas Rogers Swett, made a trade 
with Simeon Drake by swapping a mill site and water- 
power right on Suncook River for the Drake farm. Samuel 

38 



MY BOYHOOD HOME 39 

G. Drake, son of Simeon Drake, the pioneer, was born in 
Pittsneld (1798). He removed to Boston, where he be- 
came a well-known book dealer, author, and publisher. 
One of his many books is " Drake's History and An- 
tiquities of Boston" (1852). His son, Samuel Adams 
Drake, born in Boston, is the author of many popular 
books on New England scenery and history. 

In the Drake-Swett house my father, Eben Swett, was 
born (1799), and here he died (1842). Here I was born 
July 31, 1830. Here lived for many years my cousin, 
David Knowlton Swett, and here he died (1896). Since 
his death the place has changed hands several times; but 
though the exterior of the farmhouse has been modern- 
ized, the original framework of huge pines, hewn out with 
the broadax, remain without change, and its timbers are 
still as sound as they were a century ago. The place is 
now known as the " Sculkook Farm." 

It was into this historic house that my father took his 
young wife after his marriage in 1829. A two-story wing 
was added to the original farmhouse, so that there was 
ample room for two separate families. 

It was my misfortune to be an only child, but the place 
of brothers and sisters was partially filled by the five 
children of my uncle, Thomas Rogers Swett, Jr., who lived 
in a house near by, on a part of the original Swett farm. 
My cousin, David Knowlton Swett, about my own age, 
was my playmate for ten years. 

The earliest recollections of my childhood include pic- 
tures of my mother, busy in spinning woolen yarn on a 
large spinning wheel, or in weaving cloth on the great 
loom in the large chamber of the second story. I recall 
frequent visits to the rooms of my grandmother, who 



40 MY BOYHOOD HOME 

often invited me to sit up to her table and drink sage tea 
from her curious little blue china teacups. At one end of 
the kitchen there was a row of "dressers" well stocked with 
pewter plates and platters which shone in my eyes as if made 
of massive silver. The tall eight-day clock, the great fire- 
place with its crane, pothooks, and kettles, — I see them 
still. My grandmother often allowed me to look at the 
pictures in the large well-worn family Bible, and some- 
times she read aloud to me interesting Bible stories. 

Of my first summer at school I have only hazy recollec- 
tions, but I retain a vivid picture of the antique schoolhouse 
on the edge of the village near the mill pond and cotton 
factory, and of the long unpainted desks rising like seats 
in a theater on each side of a central level floor, at one 
end of which there was a huge open fireplace. One of the 
first things I learned at school was the name of the presi- 
dent of the United States, Andrew Jackson. One day, for 
whispering to another boy, I was ordered by the teacher, 
Miss White, to sit on the back seat with a row of big girls 
who laughed at me. At another time Miss White un- 
justly accused me of telling her a lie, and I hated her ever 
after. On my way to school we passed along the edge of 
the mill pond where the dragon flies, known to us as the 
"Devil's darning needles," were a constant source of 
terror to me because the big boys said they would sting us 
and then sew up our eyelids. We had no nature study in 
school in those days. 

About this time a kind friend living in Dover, Miss 
Lucy Ham, sent me five bound numbers of Peter Par- 
ley's Magazine, which proved for several years a source 
of delight. The first piece of verse that I committed to 
memory from these books was a poem of ten stanzas 



FIRST DAYS AT SCHOOL 41 

entitled "The Sailor Boy's Story/' which I recited at 
home to admiring visitors. The piece began as follows: 

" I am a little sailor boy, 

And would you know my story ? 
I've sailed across the ocean blue, 
And seen it in its glory." 

The following summer the school was again taught by 
Miss White. I have dim recollections of Webster's Spell- 
ing Book. I had learned to read at home before I was 
sent to school, and therefore made rapid progress in both 
reading and spelling. 

In 1836 my father and mother moved into Pittsfield 
village to take charge of the large "corporation boarding 
house" connected with the cotton factory. At that time 
the operatives in the factory were almost exclusively 
daughters of farmers living in Pittsfield and the sur- 
rounding towns. The times were hard, and this was the 
only way they had of earning money. I did not like life 
in the village. In 1837 there came the great commercial 
panic which swept over New England like a tornado. I 
remember well the general talk about hard times. My 
father continued to carry on the farm, and my mother 
worked hard in managing the boarding house, but the 
business proved unprofitable on account of the high prices 
of foodstuffs, and we all moved back to the farm, much 
to my delight. 

While we lived in the village, the old schoolhouse on 
the river road was torn down, and the school was held for 
a year in the academy building. The only distinct rec- 
ollection that I have is, that one day I boldly made a 
protest against too long a lesson assigned in Emerson's 



42 MY BOYHOOD HOME 

Primary Arithmetic, whereupon the reasonable teacher 
cut it down one-half. Our reading book was the "Pro- 
gressive Reader," of which I can remember vividly only 
one piece, and that was an extract which treated on the 
properties of metals. From this lesson I learned that 
"iron is ductile, that is, capable of being drawn out into 
wire;" also that "gold is malleable, that is, it can be 
hammered into thin sheets called gold leaf." I recall 
also a story about the Good Samaritan illustrated by a 
woodcut. I remember that my father bought for me a 
small book of stories about Indians and Indian wars in 
colonial times, and the reading and re-reading of this 
precious volume was the beginning of a lifelong taste for 
American history. I discovered in my father's library two 
bound volumes of the Penny Magazine, which contained 
illustrated descriptions of most of the famous sea fights in 
the War of 1812. I recall in particular the accounts of 
the capture of the Guerriere by the Constitution, of the 
Macedonian by the United States, and of the Java by 
the Constitution. The stories of these great naval victo- 
ries I read and re-read until I knew them by heart; and 
as I studied the rude woodcuts of the disabled British 
frigates, my heart swelled with patriotic pride. One thing 
troubled me, I did not know exactly how to pronounce the 
name of the British frigate — the Guerriere. 

Next winter the school was held in the new brick school- 
house, situated on a bluff from which we had a view of 
the village, the cotton mill, the gristmill, the mill pond, 
and Catamount. Abel Berry, the schoolmaster, a grad- 
uate of Dartmouth College, was a young law student 
who was paying his way by teaching school. The school 
was now crowded with big boys and big girls, some of 



EARLY RECOLLECTIONS 43 

them from sixteen to eighteen years of age. I began to 
pick up ideas by listening to the recitations of the older 
pupils. 

The schoolmaster boarded at my father's house, and I 
was allowed to go with him to the evening spelling matches 
held once in two weeks. I soon ranked as a good speller. 
The master was a ready talker, and he and my father 
were engaged many long winter evenings in discussing 
politics, religion, and books. I was allowed to be present,, 
and from these long conversations I learned far more 
than I acquired from my school study of textbooks. 
When the winter term closed, the master went "out 
West" and opened a law office. 

Our next teacher during the summer term was Miss 
French, a beautiful and accomplished lady, who won all 
our hearts by her gracious manner. She made lovely wax 
flowers and presented one to each member of our class in 
Peter Parley's Geography. She sometimes allowed me 
and my dearest friend, Tom Nutter, to study our les- 
sons outside of the schoolroom, under the shade of a big 
maple tree near the school. Happy days were those, and 
we all did our best to learn our lessons. 

The regular term of three months was supplemented by 
a private school, continued for six weeks, during which 
time we each paid a small tuition fee for the teacher. 
This was in accordance with the usual custom at that 
time in most New England schools. During my eight 
years of attendance in the common school I was kept at 
school about eight months in each year. 

Miss French was succeeded by Ruth Leavitt, a veteran 
teacher, famous for drill and discipline. Her successor 
was Sarah Batchelder, the daughter of our near neighbor, 



44 MY BOYHOOD HOME 

Colonel Batchelder. She sang in the church choir, and 
taught us two very simple children's songs, which in- 
cluded all of my training in music in the common school. 
I liked her very well, but thought more of her younger 
sister, Abbie Batchelder, "the prettiest girl in school," 
who had a train of youthful admirers among the small 
boys. 

And now there came, during the winter term, a law 
student, Enoch Eastman by name, over six feet in height, 
with the muscles of an athlete and a swarthy complexion 
like that of Daniel Webster, whose mother was an East- 
man. There were two big boys, about twenty years old, 
who constituted a class in Comstock's Natural Philoso- 
phy, and I immediately established myself as a silent 
partner and outside member of the class. This giant 
master did something more than hear textbook recita- 
tions. He talked, he explained, he illustrated, he even 
laughed. I never missed a lesson, and a lifelong interest 
in physics began in this surreptitious listening to the 
words of this great teacher. How genial he was! Arith- 
metic was made easy, grammar was sweet to the taste, 
and the whole world seemed delightful. When school 
closed this ideal teacher also went out West to open a 
law office. 

I was now old enough to attend with my father the 
evening meetings of the "Pittsfield Lyceum," in other 
words, a debating society. My study of politics began in 
hearing a long debate on the question, " Ought Texas to 
be admitted into the Union ?" This discussion was car- 
ried on for several meetings by two able lawyers, the 
minister, schoolmaster Eastman, and my father. I still 
have in my possession my father's written argument in 



ALMANACS AND " COFFIN HANDBILLS " 45 

the affirmative, which is a clear and forcible paper. At 
my father's house the subjects of politics and religion were 
frequently under discussion, and these conversations^ to 
which I was a silent listener, constituted no small part of 
my education. 

Monroe Berry, educated in Pittsfield Academy, was the 
teacher during the next winter term. Him I remember 
with pleasure because he graciously granted my request 
to allow me to study Goodrich's History of the United 
States, though I was the only pupil in the class. With 
this history I was delighted. The part that thrilled me 
most was a detailed account of the battle of Bunker Hill. 
At this time I was studying Smith's Grammar, Adams's 
New Arithmetic, Colburn's Intellectual Arithmetic, Smith's 
Geography, Webster's Spelling Book, and Porter's Rhetor- 
ical Reader. At the end of the term this teacher went 
out West. 

In addition to the limited number of books that fell 
into my hands, I found in the garret a file of Dudley 
Leavitt's Almanacs, and some files of the New Hamp- 
shire Patriot, a weekly political paper, edited by Isaac 
Hill, a stanch supporter of Andrew Jackson and his 
policy. I remember to this day a campaign doggerel on 
the United States Bank, beginning as follows: 

"Bah! Bah! Nicholas, have you any cash ? 
Have the five and thirty millions wholly gone to smash ?" etc. 

It is hardly necessary to add that I became a Democrat, 
opposed to a national bank. 

At another time I found a roll of " Coffin Handbills," 
issued during the Jackson presidential campaign, in which 
a 01d Hickory" was charged with the murder of six militia- 
men. This campaign document was illustrated by a row 



46 MY BOYHOOD HOME 

of six black coffins'. As both my father and my grand- 
father were Jackson democrats, this roll of campaign 
literature, instead of being distributed, had been carefully 
stowed away in a hidden corner of the old farmhouse. 

It was about this time that my father was reading 
Combe's "Constitution of Man," and I have a vivid 
recollection of conversations between him and school- 
master Eastman about this book. In particular, it was 
impressed upon me that sickness is the result of violations 
of the laws of nature, and not of a special Providence, 
mysteriously designed for our own good. 

About this time, while foraging in the old garret for 
reading matter, I came across a well-worn copy of "The 
New England Primer, Or an early and pleasant Guide to the 
Art of Reading, Adorned with Cutis," a little book that 
was extensively used in the colonial common schools for 
more than a century. It was a rare prize, which I re- 
garded with a singular kind of wonder. It began with 
the alphabet, followed by five pages of words for spelling, 
which began with words of one syllable like "age, beef," 
etc., and ended with " a-bom-in-a-tion, ed-if-i-ca-tion," 
etc. Then there came an illustrated alphabet, each letter 
being adorned with a rough woodcut and accompanied 
by a rude couplet in rhyme. Some of these verses have 
stuck in my memory through life. Here are three of 
them, running as follows: 

A. " In Adam's fall, D. " The Deluge drowned 

We sinned all. " The Earth around. " 

F. "The idle fool 

Is whipped at school." 

Then followed a rude woodcut of the " burning at the 
stake of John Rogers, a martyr of Smithfield, England." 



NOAH WEBSTER 47 

Next there appeared a condensed lesson in Biblical history, 
running in part as follows: 

Who was the first man? Adam. 

Who was the first woman? Eve. 

Who was the first murderer? Cain. 

Who was the first martyr? Abel. 

Who was the oldest man? Methuselah. 

Who was the meekest man? Moses. 

Who was the strongest man? Samson. 

Who was the wisest man? Solomon. 

Who was in the whale's belly? Jonah. 

The chief piece of resistance in this primer for children 
was "The Shorter Catechism, agreed upon by the Assembly 
of Divines at Westminster," which filled up twenty-five 
solid pages of metaphysical theology. I read the first 
question, "What is the chief end of man?" and the answer, 
"Man's chief end is to glorify God and enjoy him for- 
ever." Most of the remainder I skipped because I failed 
to understand what it all meant. The New England 
Primer ended with an eight-page "Dialogue between 
Christ, A Youth, and the Devil," all in rhyme that passed 
for poetry. 

It was Webster's Spelling Book that finally succeeded 
the New England Primer in the common schools in New 
England. Noah Webster himself, born (1758) on a 
small farm near Hartford, Connecticut, was sent to the 
common school and well trained on the New England 
Primer. He was fitted for Yale College by a clergyman, 
and was graduated from Yale in 1776. After his gradua- 
tion his strict Puritan father handed him an eight-dollar 
bill in Continental currency, worth four dollars in silver, 
saying, "This is all I can afford to give you; take it and 
earn your own living." Naturally enough he began by 



48 MY BOYHOOD HOME 

teaching in a private school for ten years, but meanwhile 
finding time to study law and to write a number of school- 
books, one of which, Webster's American Spelling Book, 
(1782) had a greater popularity and a longer lease of life 
than any other elementary schoolbook published in the 
United States. It is pleasant to remember that the in- 
come from this book enabled him to support his family 
during the long period that he was engaged in compiling 
that monumental book, Noah Webster's Dictionary. 
For many years, about the middle of the nineteenth cen- 
tury, the sales of Webster's Spelling Book averaged a 
million copies a year. 

Among numerous other schoolbooks, Noah Webster 
tried his hand on "The Little Reader's Assistant," pub- 
lished at Northampton, Mass., 1791, at the time he was a 
schoolmaster in that town. It was a book of one hundred 
and forty-eight pages, beginning with a series of short 
stories relating to the history of our own country. Re- 
membering the New England Primer which he studied 
when a small boy, he put into the middle of this book 
a catechism, but it was a " Farmer's Catechism" 
instead of the "Assembly Catechism." I cannot resist 
the temptation of quoting a few sentences from this first 
attempt, a century ago, to introduce eight pages about 
agriculture into a schoolbook. , 

" The Farmer's Catechism " 

Q. What is the best business a man can do? 
Ans. Tilling the ground or farming. 
Q. Why is farming the best business? 

Ans. Because it is the most necessary, the most healthy, the most in- 
nocent, and ths most agreeable employment of men. 



MY COMMON-SCHOOL TRAINING . 49 

Q. Why is farming the most innocent employment of men? 

Ans. Because farmers have fewer temptations than other men. They 
have but little dealings with others, so that they have fewer opportuni- 
ties to cheat than other men. . . . 

Q. What is the great art of cultivating the land to advantage? 

Ans. It consists in raising the greatest quantity of produce on the 
smallest quantity of land with the least expsnss and labor. 

My Common-School Training as a Whole 

In looking back on my eight years' attendance in a 
village school, I feel that I was fortunate in falling, each 
winter term, under the instruction of a superior class of 
men, some of whom were graduates of Dartmouth College. 
These teachers made a stronger and deeper impression on 
me in every way than was made by the young women who 
taught the summer schools. 

In those days it was the teacher's chief duty to hear 
textbook lessons, and the chief end of the pupils was to 
memorize the textbook and assimilate the matter as best 
they could. It was assumed that whatever a child could 
repeat from memory, he could also understand by intuition. 

We had no nature study, no drawing, no singing, no 
composition writing. But we learned to spell correctly, 
to read well, and to write a legible hand. We were thor- 
oughly drilled in Colburn's Intellectual Arithmetic, and 
poorly trained in written arithmetic, which we pursued on 
the individual system. Whenever we "got stuck on 
a hard sum," we were allowed to ask some older boy to 
show us how to do it. We worked as hard as we could, 
and our chief aim was to get through the book. With 
each new teacher we began the textbook with addition, 
and never ciphered further than cube root or alligation. 
John Batchelder, the oldest boy in school, was my coach 



50 MY BOYHOOD HOME 

in arithmetic. He was a descendant of the Batchelders of 
Hampton, of tough English stock. When he became of 
age, he emigrated to Illinois, bought a farm, and ten years 
later persuaded his younger brothers to follow his example. 

One vital defect in our study of arithmetic was that we 
had no training whatever in accuracy. I am certain that 
no one of our teachers ever once mentioned the importance 
of careful and accurate work. There was no blackboard 
in school, and no teacher ever gave us any drill outside of 
the printed pages. 

In geography the teacher seldom asked us a question 
not printed in the book; seldom ventured on any kind of 
an explanation, or gave us a supplementary idea. In 
front of the schoolhouse there ran a beautiful river, but no 
teacher ever called our attention to it. Right before our 
eyes a picturesque mountain rose to the height of twelve 
hundred feet, but no teacher ever mentioned it, or ever 
suggested that we should climb to its summit and see how 
the surface of the earth looked. 

We were well trained in textbook grammar and parsing, 
but we had no exercises in writing our mother tongue. 
The teachers kept no record of checks or credits. We had 
no written examinations, but in spelling and Colburn's 
Mental Arithmetic we recited in class, and were stimulated 
by trying to get to the head of the class. We were so 
thoroughly drilled on Webster's Spelling Book, in oral 
spelling and pronunciation, that, in after life spelling 
with me became automatic, with little occasion for refer- 
ence to a dictionary. One good result of this general 
method of memorizing textbook lessons without expla- 
nation was a fixed habit of finding out by myself the 
meaning of the printed page, and as in after life my educa- 



WORK AND PLAY 5 1 

tion was largely obtained from books and reading outside 
of schools, this habit became of vital importance to me. 

The school discipline was reasonably strict, but not 
severe. Of corporal punishment there was very little, and 
that only in cases of insubordination. I was never whipped 
and was seldom reprimanded in school. Never once in 
my school life was I "kept in" after school hours to study 
an unlearned lesson. I always liked to study, and I had a 
strong Puritan sense of duty. I was never absent from 
school except for sickness. Truancy from school was un- 
heard of, fighting was unknown. We had ample grounds 
for playing ball. We had in summer the Suncook River 
for a swimming pool, and in winter the neighboring mill 
pond for a skating rink. Coasting and snowballing were 
our winter amusements. On the whole, we enjoyed life, 
liked to go to school, studied our lessons, and memorized 
books. Our only special training in morals and religion 
was the morning opening exercise in reading the New 
Testament, each pupil reading in turn a single " verse." 
Neither note nor comment was made by the teacher. 

But my home training was a most important supple- 
ment to my school instruction. My father taught me to 
write, and gave me occasional lessons in arithmetic. I 
was neither petted nor indulged, though always treated 
with kind consideration and sterling common sense. 
Though never overworked, I was required to do my share 
in the daily chores about the house and farm. On Satur- 
days I was allowed to visit some of my numerous cousins, 
or to go a-fishing in the Suncook River. On Sundays I 
always went with my father and mother to the Congre- 
gational meetinghouse, and enjoyed the going. The 
church was a social institution, and my chats with other 



52 MY BOYHOOD HOME 

boys during the "noon intermission" were more attractive 
to me than were the long theological discourses of the min- 
ister. After attending church, my father and mother often 
went out, in summertime, to walk in the woods or pas- 
tures, and took me along. There was nothing of the old 
Puritan hardness in our way of life. On Sunday morning 
my father read aloud a chapter from the Bible and made a 
family prayer, and this was the only religious service in 
the family. Even the custom of saying grace at meals 
had gone out of use. I was not drilled on the Assembly 
Catechism, nor shut up in the house on the Sabbath, nor 
prematurely crammed with metaphysical theology. 

In fact, during my boyhood I was surrounded by liberal 
influences. My grandfather Swett was a sturdy disbeliever 
in witches, ghosts, and devils, and to him and my father 
I owe a special debt of gratitude that my young life was 
not darkened by superstitious beliefs. Though my father 
was a religious man, he declined to join the church be- 
cause he could not subscribe to all the dogmas of the 
creed. My mother was a church member, but was never 
troubled about theological metaphysics. My grandfather 
Swett was a Universalist; my grandmother Swett was a 
Freewill Baptist; my grandfather French, a Calvin Baptist, 
and my grandmother French, a Congregationalist. I 
attended many revival meetings, camp meetings, and 
" protracted meetings," but none of them made any deep 
impression on me. Yet I was a serious-minded boy who 
thought about religion, but was in revolt against dogmatic 
Puritan theology. Some years later a series of tract- 
sermons, by William Ellery Channing, fell into my hands, 
and thereafter I called myself a Unitarian, though for years 
I generally attended the Congregationol church. 



A GREAT BEREAVEMENT 53 

I have a vivid recollection of one incident which affords 
a striking illustration of the old-time manner of introduc- 
ing to young boys the subject of religion. Our minister, a 
profound and solemn theologian, asked the boys of his 
society to meet him one Sunday afternoon in the vestry 
of the meetinghouse. After making a prayer, the min- 
ister plunged at once into his subject. He called up the 
first boy and said: "Thomas, do you think you have 
experienced religion?" "Yes, sir," was the conventional 
reply. Similar questions were put to each boy in turn, 
and each boy answered, "Yes, sir." It happened that I 
was the last boy in the line. The boy next above me was 
known as the wickedest boy in the school, but he told the 
minister that he had been converted at the last camp 
meeting, and that he had repented of his sins and was now 
a Christian. At first I thought that I would tell the truth 
and say, "No, sir;" but when the minister called on me 
and said in a solemn tone, "John, have you any rea- 
son to think that you have experienced a change of 
heart ? " my courage failed me. I could not face the dis- 
grace of being the only unregenerate sinner in the class, 
and so answered in a faint voice, "Yes, sir." I went home 
from that meeting ashamed of myself because I had lacked 
the courage to tell the truth. This was the first cold- 
blooded, deliberate lie that I can remember of telling, and 
I cannot help feeling at this remote time that the minister 
led me into temptation. 

Up to the age of twelve years my life had been one of 
unclouded happiness, but now there fell upon me the 
darkness of a great bereavement. My father was taken 
down with an attack of typhoid fever, and after a few days 
of delirium passed away from us at the early age of forty- 



54 MY BOYHOOD HOME 

three years. After his death, for many weeks I wandered 
around the farm, refusing to be comforted. The burden 
of a great anxiety fell upon me, for I realized that I must 
look out for myself and make my own way in the world. 

My father had always treated me with tenderness, con- 
sideration, and justice, seeming to. have an intuitive per- 
ception of the shyness of a boy's nature. He trained me 
to work, but gave me ample freedom for play. He looked 
on the sunny side of life, and his manifold kindness to me 
made me contented, happy, hopeful, and obedient. He 
never had occasion to whip me, and I can recall only one 
reprimand. He had received a good common-school edu- 
cation, supplemented by a number of terms at an academy, 
and by teaching for several winters in district schools. 
His strong taste for reading educated him all through his 
life. He was for years the town clerk of Pittsfield, and 
was repeatedly elected as one of the three selectmen. 
He was genial in manner, social in disposition, temperate 
in his habits, and just in all his dealings. He was a man 
given to religious thought, and was for many years the 
teacher of a large Bible class of adults in the Congrega- 
tional church. He took an active interest in the village 
Lyceum, or debating society, in the common schools, 
and in all other social and town affairs. His library was 
a limited one, but was larger and better than that of most 
other farmers in town. In his business affairs he was 
careful and prudent, but was not over-economical, and 
money-making was not a passion with him. 

The Age oe Homespun 

A good illustration of the manner in which a New Eng- 
land farmer lived near the close of the " homespun age" 



$ 123.85 


$n8.4i 


372-57 


222.80 


182.40 


134-85 


187.69 


228.71 


235-33 


137.16 


324-36 


123.24 



THE AGE OF HOMESPUN 55 

is afforded by one of my father's account books, which 
begins with the year of his marriage (1829) and continues 
for five years. Every item of expense and income is here 
entered in detail. The balance of receipts and expenses 
runs as follows: 

Year ending Receipts Expenses 

Nov., 1830 

1831 

1832 

i833 

1834 

1835 

$1426. 20 $965.17 

In no year, except in 1833, did the family expenses 
outrun the income, and the total of small savings during 
the six years amounted to $461.03. The account book 
from 1835 to the time of his death was unfortunately 
lost. The items of the above account show that the 
family lived chiefly on the products of the farm. Wheat 
and corn supplied the breadstuff s; beef, mutton, pork, and 
poultry were home products; tea, coffee, sugar, and spices 
were imported luxuries. The woolen clothing worn in 
winter was chiefly of domestic manufacture. My own 
winter clothing, up to the age of twelve, was spun and 
woven by my mother, and the cloth sent to the fulling 
mill to be fulled and dyed. My mother was an expert 
weaver of both woolen and linen cloth. She knit woolen 
stockings for the family, and also for sale in the market 
for the purchase of gowns and millinery. In all families 
knitting was the steady occupation of women during the 
long winter evenings. This old account book shows the 
prudent management by which I was left, after my 



56 MY BOYHOOD HOME 

father's death, with means to enable me to acquire a fair 
academic education. My father's estate was appraised at 
fifteen hundred dollars. 1 

1 It seems fitting to close this chapter with a quotation from Horace 
Bushnell's " Secular Sermon" on the " Age of Homespun," delivered at the 
centennial celebration of Litchfield County, Connecticut, 1851. 

"In these olden times, these genuine days of homespun, they supposed, 
in their simplicity, that thrift represented work, and looked about seldom 
for any more delicate and sharper way of getting on. They did not call 
a man's property his fortune, but they spoke of one another as being worth 
so much, conceiving that he had laid it up as the reward or fruit of his 
deservings. The house was a factory on the farm; the farm, a grower and 
producer for the house. 

" It was also a great point in this homespun mode of life, that it imparted 
exactly what many speak of only with contempt, a closely girded habit of 
economy. Harnessed all together in the producing process, young and 
old, male and female, from the boy that rode the plow-horse to the grand- 
mother knitting under her spectacles, they had no conception of squander- 
ing lightly what they had all been at work, thread by thread, and grain by 
grain, to produce. Men of patrimony in the great world, therefore, notic- 
ing their small way of trade or expenditure, are ready to charge them with 
meanness, simply because they knew things only in the small. Still, this 
knowing things only in the small, it will be found, is anything but meanness. 
It will be found that children brought up in this way, to know things in the 
small, what they cost and what is their value, have, in just that fact, one 
of the best securities of character, and most certain elements of power and 
success in life. When the hard, wiry-looking patriarch of homespun, for 
example, sets off for Hartford or Bridgeport, to exchange the little surplus 
of his year's production, carrying his provision with him, and the fodder 
for his team, and taking his boy along to show him the great world, you 
may laugh at the simplicity, or pity, if you will, the sordid look of the picture, 
but, five or ten years hence, this boy will probably enough be found in 
college digging out the cent's worth of his father's money in hard study; 
and some twenty years later, he will be returning in his honors, as the cele- 
brated judge, or governor, or senator and public orator, from some one of 
the great States of the Republic, to bless the sight, once more, of that ven- 
erated pair who shaped his beginning and planted the small seeds of his 
future success. " — Work and Play, by Horace Bushnell. New York : Charles 
Scribner, 1864. 



CHAPTER IV 

PITTSFIELD ACADEMY; MR. EDWIN F. SHERMAN, THE 
IDEAL PRINCIPAL; MY VACATION WAGES 

The earlier endowed academies in New England were 
established, like the Boston Latin school, for the special 
purpose of fitting boys for college. They were denomi- 
national institutions, designed in the main to perpetuate 
the orthodox religious faith of the fathers. Among these 
were the Dummer Academy at Byfield (1762); the Phillips- 
Andover Academy in Massachusetts (1780); and the 
Phillips-Exeter Academy in New Hampshire (1781). 

Soon after the adoption of the Constitution, the New 
England states, in common with other states in the Union, 
entered upon what is called the "age of academies." The 
decadent grammar schools died out by slow degrees, 
and were replaced by small rural academies, most of 
which were under denominational control, though, in gen- 
eral, somewhat liberal in spirit. Most of these secondary 
schools were supported by tuition fees, though the build- 
ings were generally erected by subscriptions or by small 
bequests. These new academies provided a classical 
course to fit boys for college, and also a general elective 
course for both boys and girls, intended as an outfit for 
the ordinary pursuits of life. 

For half a century these academies supplemented the dis- 
trict common schools by giving great numbers of young men 
and young women a fair equipment for their work in life. 
After the academies had fulfilled their mission, they also 

57 



58 PITTSFIELD ACADEMY 

went into decadence soon after the middle of the nine- 
teenth century. The rapid increase in wealth and in pop- 
ulation, the rise of manufacturing towns, villages, and 
cities, the general advancement in science and in literature, 
together with the spread of liberal ideas and the rising 
tide of democracy, all united in gradually bringing about 
the general establishment of high schools supported by 
public taxation, in which young men and young women 
were placed on a footing of equality in education. Thus, 
in the course of two centuries, the colonial dame schools, 
with their petty tuition fees of a penny a day, had de- 
veloped into free primary schools; the Latin grammar 
schools had been largely superseded by the English gram- 
mar schools, in which English grammar was taught instead 
of Latin; the academies were largely superseded by free 
high schools with both a classical course and an English 
course of study. 

It was in accord with the spirit of the times that, in 
1829, half a century after the first common school in Pitts- 
field had opened its doors to all the children, both "mayle 
and femaile," the people contributed lumber, labor, and 
money for the erection of an academy building. Every- 
body lent a hand. The building was dedicated in 1830, 
the year in which I was born. The population of the 
town at this time was a little less than one thousand in- 
habitants, — a homogeneous people, exclusively of English 
Puritan descent. They were neither rich nor poor. 
Agriculture was the leading occupation. The small farms 
ranged in value from one thousand to three thousand 
dollars. The farmer freeholders worked hard, lived fru- 
gally, and stood in town meeting on a broad footing of 
democratic equality in respect to property as well as to 




The Old Academy, 1845 




The Swett Homestead 



59 



60 PITTSFIELD ACADEMY 

suffrage. The richest man in town was supposed to be 
worth from five to ten thousand dollars. 

The academy opened in October, 1830, with an attend- 
ance of forty-eight students, seventeen young women and 
thirty-one young men. My grandfather, Abraham French, 
was a member of the first board of trustees. In the course 
of time several small bequests were made to the school, 
which served to keep the building in repair. This insti- 
tution was maintained for sixty-five years as an academy, 
and was then transformed into a free public high school. 

After my father's death, my mother and I continued to 
live on the farm for nearly a year. I went to school and 
took care of the cattle during the winter. In the follow- 
ing spring the farm was leased, and my mother and myself 
went to board with my uncle, John F. French, who lived 
on the French homestead on the edge of Pittsfield village. 
My grandfather and grandmother French lived in the 
main house, and my uncle and his wife in the added wing, 
the families being entirely separate. Individualism was 
too strong to admit of cooperative housekeeping. My 
uncle, educated in common school and academy, managed 
the farm in summer, and worked in winter at making 
shoes for the Lynn manufacturers. His wife, Aunt 
Ruth, one of the smartest of housekeepers, besides doing 
her housework, earned ready money by binding shoes 
for the Lynn manufacturers. In this pleasant home my 
life began to brighten. 

It was into Pittsfield academy that I entered in the fall 
term of 1844, a sensitive, diffident, thoughtful, studious 
boy, who had no marked talent, but who read every book 
that he could get hold of. 

The preceptor, or principal, of the academy was Edwin 



COMPOSITION WRITING 6 1 

F. Sherman, a graduate of Dartmouth College, and a 
law student. He was an ideal teacher, who knew how to 
waken boys and girls into intellectual life. He talked with 
us; he explained things; he was human. He took a lively 
interest in our games of ball out of doors, as well as in our 
lessons in the schoolroom. I can picture him to this day 
as he stood at the blackboard explaining some problem 
in arithmetic or algebra, in manner easy, graceful, and 
animated. My studies were Porter's Rhetorical Reader, 
Adams's Arithmetic, Day's Algebra, Smith's Grammar, com- 
position, and declamation. I have preserved to this day 
a complete file of my compositions during this first term; 
and I hold in memory extracts from Webster's speeches, 
which I declaimed with fear and trembling on that high 
academy platform before the eyes of the assembled stu- 
dents. We were required to write a composition every 
other week, but without a hint, suggestion, or word of 
advice from the teacher as to what we should write about, 
and without any instruction whatever in " the art of writing 
the English language with propriety," which was assumed 
to have been learned by studying Smith's Grammar. In 
my youthful dearth of ideas I consulted my cousin, 
Matilda Swett, several years older than myself, who had 
attended the academy and had learned how to write 
compositions. She selected " Spring" for a subject and 
under it wrote two or three sentences for a beginning. I 
added three or four sentences of my own, ending with the 
following philosophic aphorism: " Spring reminds us of the 
springtime of our life, when we v should study to improve 
ourselves instead of spending our time in idleness." 

After this first collaborated composition I fell back on 
my own resources, selected less abstract subjects, and 



62 PITTSFIELD ACADEMY 

succeeded better. I have now before me on the table a 
file of these exercises in good preservation. The subjects 
range as follows: "A Husking;" "Town Meeting Day;" 
"Indian Corn;" "The Early Settlement of New England;" 
"A Militia Training Day." These papers contain few 
misspelled words and few blunders in grammar. The 
improvement in each succeeding composition shows that 
I derived some benefit even from unguided attempts in 
writing. We were required to go upon the platform and 
read our compositions before the assembled school, and 
this public reading was dreaded more than the laborious 
act of writing. 

We were also required to be prepared with declama- 
tions, but no hint whatever was given as to what kind of 
selections we should make, and no training whatever was 
given in elocution. How it happened I do not know, but 
I began of my own accord to select, from LovelPs 
United States Speaker short extracts from the speeches 
of Daniel Webster. Our drill book in oral reading was 
Porter's Rhetorical Reader, which we read and re-read 
until I knew many of the gems of literature by heart. 
The many short extracts from Milton's "Paradise Lost" 
stick in my memory to this day. It seems to me that 
those Friday afternoon exercises in composition and decla- 
mation constituted a very important part of my earlier 
training, for when I began my lifework I was required 
not only to express my thoughts in print but to speak 
from the public platform. During this first term at the 
academy, I was a silent outside member of a class of older 
students in Abercrombie's Mental Philosophy; for I 
was an attentive listener to the recitations, which were 
made interesting by the anecdotes and by the illustra- 



A HIRED BOY 63 

tions of Mr. Sherman. Next term I "began to study 
Comstock's Natural Philosophy, which I pursued with 
intense interest, reciting in a large class instructed by the 
"preceptress," a sister of preceptor Sherman. 

In 1844 my mother became the second wife of William 
Berry, whose first wife was my mother's sister, Mary 
French. By this marriage I was introduced into a family 
of three cousins, two of whom were boys, one a year 
younger than myself, the other one year older. We three 
boys attended school together. 

After teaching two years, Mr. Sherman left us to begin 
the practice of law in the city of Lowell. We all regretted 
to have him go. His successor was a theological student 
preparing for the ministry. He was in every way a con- 
trast to Mr. Sherman. He was stiff in manner, was never 
seen -to smile, and he made no explanations. I studied 
hard but without my former enthusiasm. In an old 
memorandum book I find the following entries: *' March 1, 
1845. Spring term at the academy. Forty scholars. My 
studies are Andrews's Latin Grammar and Reader, Davies's 
Geometry, Day's Algebra, Comstock's Chemistry, parsing 
in ' Young's Night Thoughts.' " 

During the summer vacation I worked out as a hired 
boy on the farm of Smith R. Berry on Catamount, and 
received, according to an old memorandum book that I 
kept, $7.75, for thirty-four days' work. This rate of wages 
now seems low, but it was the current rate of 1845. This 
sum was sufficient to buy my books for the next term at 
the academy. My memorandum shows that during the 
autumn term my studies were Latin, Burrett's Geog- 
raphy of the Heavens, chemistry, algebra, and geometry; 
that I had not missed a day; and that I was in excellent 



64 PITTSFIELD ACADEMY 

health. At the end of this term our teacher silently 
flitted away to a theological school. He was a good man, 
but was lacking in tact. 

Our next principal was a law student, a graduate of 
Dartmouth. He was a scholarly man but an indiffer- 
ent teacher, who heard our book recitations but neither 
criticized nor commended us. 

During my attendance in Pittsfield Academy I read all 
the books I could borrow, but the number was small. In 
this school there was no library whatever, not even an 
English dictionary for reference. The first dictionary I 
ever used was Leverett's Latin Lexicon. Rollins's Ancient 
History fell into my hands and I waded through every 
dreary page of it. Then came Josephus, and next an 
antique history of England which I discovered in my 
grandfather's bookcase. The Boston Journal was my 
weekly newspaper. 

At this period of my boyhood I began to entertain dim 
hopes of being able to go to Dartmouth College, though I 
said nothing about it. None of my relatives or friends 
had ever given me a word of advice about going to college 
or about what I should do to earn a living. After my 
father's death I was left to decide things for myself. 

After the close of the spring term I went to work for 
my uncle, Charles French, who had rented the Swett 
farm. While helping him repair a piece of stone wall I 
sprained my back so severely that I was disabled from 
work. The change from school to farm work had been too 
sudden. Up to this time I had been tough, hardy, and 
strong, but this accident handicapped me for life. I went 
home and sent for Dr. Warren, but his treatment gave me 
no immediate relief. I felt a constant desire to draw a 



A VISIT TO SALEM 65 

long breath, but was unable to get it. I lost my appe- 
tite, became weak and low-spirited, and was a wretched 
invalid during the whole summer. For several months, 
on account of weak eyes, I could not even read; but during 
that depressing period my mother placed me under a 
great debt of gratitude by her patient kindness in reading 
aloud to me. This weary period of invalidism arrested my 
growth at a critical period of my life and left me with 
impaired digestion and broken health. 

In the cool weather of autumn I began to gather strength, 
and fortunately my aunt, Mrs. Mary (Swett) Brewster, 
who resided in Salem, Massachusetts, invited me to make 
her a visit of three months. With a change of surround- 
ings and a cheerful family of cousins, my spirits returned 
and my health improved. The old city of Salem greatly 
interested me. My cousins attended Master Lackey's 
famous grammar school for boys. After a visit to the 
school I fully realized the severity of discipline which had 
been handed down from early Puritan times. I visited 
Gallows Hill, where witches were hanged in the dark 
days of this typical Puritan town. On Sundays I listened 
to the sermons of Dr. Worcester, a typical Congregational 
minister. My uncle, Ira A. Brewster, was a lineal descend- 
ant of Elder Brewster, one of the Pilgrim Fathers. My 
aunt Mary, an intellectual woman, was deeply interested 
in the antislavery movement. 

The following winter I remained at home, reading and 
studying by myself. The succeeding spring and summer 
I worked out with the neighboring farmers as a hired 
hand in planting, plowing, and haying. I was not robust, 
but I always managed to keep up with the other hands, 
making up in will power what I lacked in muscular strength. 



66 PITTSFIELD ACADEMY 

Here is a report of my work and wages in detail, taken 

from a little pocket memorandum book which I kept at 
that time, and have carefully treasured ever since : 

An Account of My Work in 1847. 

April By 3 days' work at Wm. Lane's . $ .75 

2 days' work at Col. Batchelder's .80 

May 21 2 \ days' planting at Col. Batchelder's 1.00 

May 24 1 day's driving cattle, Isaiah Berry .25 

May 26 3 days' planting, Isaiah Berry 1.25 

June 4 2 days' work on road, Isaiah Berry .83 

June 5 1 day's planting, J. B. Berry .42 

June 10 2 days' hoeing, John French 1 . 00 

June 17 5 \ days' shingling for Wm. Lane 2 . 75 

June 25 $\ days' hoeing at Wm. Lane's 1 . 75 

J u ^y 3 3 days' haying at Col. Batchelder's 1 . 50 

July 5 1 day's hoeing, Abram French .50 

July 6 1 day's haying, Col. Batchelder's .50 

July 18 6 days' haying, Isaiah Berry 3 .00 

July £f\ days' haying, Wm. Lane's 2.25 

July 23 \\ days' haying, Wm. Lane's -75 

Aug. 7 4 days' haying, Isaiah Berry's 2 .00 

$21.30 



CHAPTER V 

STUDENT AND TEACHER 

With a little hard-earned money of my own, and a 
small amount added by my guardian and stepfather, I 
made up my mind to attend the fall term of the academy 
at Pembroke, on the Merrimac River, six miles south of 
Concord. This institution, among the earliest of endowed 
academies in New Hampshire, was founded by the Reverend 
Abel Blanchard (1818) with a bequest of twenty-five hun- 
dred dollars. Though not largely endowed, it has main- 
tained its existence up to the present time, and has fitted 
large numbers of students for Dartmouth College. This 
school had a classical course to fit students for Dartmouth 
College, and elective English courses for other students. 
When I appeared before the preceptor, Jonathan Tenney, 
a graduate of Dartmouth, I told him my story, and 
with him selected my studies, omitting Latin on account 
of the weakness of one of my eyes, the result of scarlet 
fever. My elective studies included rhetoric and com- 
position (Parker's Aids to Composition), Davies's Algebra, 
Davies's Geometry, and Cutter's Physiology. In pursuing 
rhetoric and composition under the personal instruction 
of Principal Tenney I began to learn how to express 
my thoughts in writing. The students organized a de- 
bating society and started a weekly manuscript paper, 
of which I was made editor-in-chief. From our scanty 
means we also contributed money to buy books, and made 
the beginning of a small library; for up to this time there 

67 



68 STUDENT AND TEACHER 

had never been a volume in the library room. It had not 
been supposed that any books except school textbooks were 
desirable. Pembroke Academy, like Pittsfield Academy, 
was open to young women, and their attendance made the 
meetings of our debating society doubly interesting. 

And now there began a new phase of my education. 
One day, near the close of the term, a school trustee from 
a neighboring district applied to preceptor Tenney for a 
teacher during the coming winter term. On Mr. Tenney's 
urgent recommendation and advice I entered into an 
engagement, at "ten dollars a month and board," to teach 
the Buck Street school, situated two miles from Pem- 
broke Academy, on the banks of the Suncook River not far 
from its junction with the Merrimac. Up to this time I 
had never thought of becoming a teacher; but I bought a 
copy of "The School and the Schoolmaster," by George B. 
Emerson and Alonzo D. Potter, and began to study 
methods of teaching. To prepare for the examination 
necessary to secure a certificate, I made a cram on arith- 
metic, grammar, and geography. In due time, in company 
with several other candidates, I appeared before the school 
committee, which consisted of the Reverend Abraham 
Burnham and Deacon Vose. We were asked to define 
"arithmetic, multiplication, a fraction," and to reckon 
interest on a promissory note for a given time. In gram- 
mar the chief question was: "Into what four parts is 
English grammar divided ? " We were each asked to spell 
orally two or three words, and to pronounce "gewgaw." 
We were then required to file with the board of examiners 
a certificate of good moral character from some minister 
who knew us. With this our examination was ended. 
My certificate ran as follows: 



MY FIRST SCHOOL 69 

This certifies, that we have examined Mr. John Swett in respect to his 
qualifications to teach the various branches required to be taught by a school- 
master in the district schools in this State, and are of opinion, that he is 
qualified according to law. 

(Signed) Francis Vose, 

< 

A. BlTRNHAM, 

Superintending School Committee of Pembroke. 
Pembroke, Nov. 24, 1847. 

My boarding place was in the family of the school 
trustee, which consisted of himself, an elderly bachelor, 
Rodney Carlton by name, and two sisters, elderly maiden 
ladies, named respectively Achsa and Amelia. The estab- 
lished price for boarding a schoolmaster was six dollars 
a month, which sum was drawn from the town treasurer 
by the trustee himself, thus making sure of his payment. 

The schoolhouse was a neat and comfortable one-room 
building, in which I found assembled about thirty pupils, 
the youngest of whom was eight years old, and the eldest, 
twenty-one years. But most of them were pupils of 
marked ability, and it was a pleasure to teach them. 
The school was without maps or charts, or even a dic- 
tionary for reference. As no pupil had ever seen a school 
globe, I asked one of my big boys, Horace Towne, who 
worked in a mill where there was a lathe for woodwork, to 
turn a six-inch globe for me. I ruled this globe for me- 
ridians and parallels, outlined carefully the continents, 
oceans, and large islands, fitted in the poles, and var- 
nished the whole. This inexpensive piece of apparatus I 
used in all my classes in geography with good results. 
I took it with me when, afterwards, I went to teach in 
Massachusetts, where I found a school also destitute of a 
map, chart, globe, or reference dictionary. If I was not 



^o STUDENT AND TEACHER 

skilled in psychological methods, I was full of enthusiasm 
tempered by common sense. My whole ambition centered 
on my school, and the people appreciated the fact. 

There was no occasion to resort to corporal punishment 
in maintaining discipline, for I succeeded in interesting 
the pupils in their work. I skated with the big boys on 
the mill pond and took part with them in snowballing. 
The schoolhouse had no ventilator, and I immediately 
borrowed tools and arranged a window to lower from the 
top. An economical taxpayer, who thought this involved 
an unnecessary waste of fuel, nailed up the window at 
night; but I drew out the nails and lowered it again. 
When I last saw that schoolhouse, many years afterwards, 
the window was still lowered. 

One morning, on my way to school, I bowed to a farmer 
driving past, who sang out, "My boy, who teaches your 
school this winter ? " "A cross old man by the name of 
Swett," I replied. He told this story at the grocery store, 
and "Old Swett" passed into a proverb in the district, 
though I was then only seventeen years old. 

The people of this district were so well pleased with my 
teaching that they hired me to continue the term for six 
weeks longer, paying my wages by subscription. To me 
the winter's work was worth more, as an educative power, 
than any one year at the academy, because it developed 
character and strengthened self-reliance and decision. 
When the term closed, the people insisted on a conditional 
promise that I would return and teach their school the 
following winter. I returned to Pembroke Academy and 
pursued my studies under Mr. Tenney's instruction dur- 
ing the spring and summer, and then went back to the 
Buck Street school and taught during the winter term of 




John Swett 
as a young teacher aged seventeen 

From an old daguerreotype, 1847 



71 



72 STUDENT AND TEACHER 

four months, supplemented by a rate-bill term of six weeks. 
In the printed town reports my school received " honorable 
mention" as one of the best in town, for each of the two 
years. 

1 Many of the pupils in this school afterwards attended 
Pembroke Academy for a few terms, and they emigrated 
to the West, where they made good records. One of them, 
Irad Cochran, went to California, and thence to New 
Mexico, where he became a wealthy ranch owner. He 
shipped his live stock to his younger brother, another of 
my boys, who became the successful manager of a stock- 
yard in the city of Chicago. Another promising boy, 
Horace Towne, married the most scholarly girl in school, 
a sister of the boys just mentioned, and emigrated to 
California, making a success in life. Three other pupils 
moved with their father and mother to Illinois. 

Manual Training on a Farm 

In the spring of 1848 I began a three months' course of 
manual training on the farm of one of my numerous 
uncles. This interchange of academy, school-teaching, 
and farm work was continued for several years, not from 
special love of manual labor, but as a physical training 
which I thought my constitution needed. Nevertheless 
I chafed under the lack of mental stimulus, though I 
found time on rainy days to keep up my reading in liter- 
ature and history. Some books I bought, others I bor- 
rowed. A complete file of the New York Knickerbocker 
Magazine was placed in my hands by Mrs. Martha (Cilley) 
Berry, and was carefully read from beginning to end. 
This reading was the foundation of a lifelong taste for 
magazine literature. Some years later I became a spo- 



WORKING ON THE FARM 73 

radic contributor of fugitive articles to the Knickerbocker 
Magazine, and some other publications. The New York 
Weekly Tribune and the Boston Weekly Journal gave me 
news of the world and the politics of the time. Shake- 
speare, Scott, and Burns, constituted a part of my reading 
in literature. There never was a day that I did not find 
at least half an hour for reading. On rainy days, when 
there was no outdoor work, I read most of the time. It 
was at this time that I began to find floating around in the 
newspapers a few of John G. Whittier's poems, quite a 
number of which I committed to memory as I worked 
alone in the field. 

During this season I received the customary wages for 
farm work, — eight dollars a month. My uncle, Enoch 
French, was a house carpenter, who, when a young man, 
had worked at his trade in the city of Boston. He was a 
man of marked intelligence and of genial manner. His 
son, John Cate French, about my own age, had learned to 
make Lynn shoes, and was at work with another man, 
Elder Harvey, in a small shoe shop on the farm. I 
was entirely at home in this pleasant family and my 
cousin seemed to me like a brother. This cousin of mine, 
after an attendance for several terms at Gilmanton Acad- 
emy and at Pembroke, organized the New Hampshire 
Fire Insurance Company at Manchester, and became one 
of the notable business men of the state. 

In the autumn of 1848 I gladly returned to academic 
study at Pembroke. A classmate and myself tried the 
experiment of hiring a room and boarding ourselves, as a 
measure of protection against the conventional boarding- 
house diet of hot biscuit and pie. Aided by frequent 
relays of provisions from home, we thrived on a Spartan 



74 STUDENT AND TEACHER 

diet, but did not repeat the experiment a second term. 
What little skill I acquired in cooking proved useful to me a 
few years later. Athletic exercises were not in vogue in the 
academies of this period, though military drill was introduced 
into a few schools. For exercise I took long tramps over the 
surrounding country. In fact, many schools of that period 
recognized the existence of mind only, and ignored the 
body as of little worth. Dr. A. D. Mayo, speaking of the 
schools, academies, and colleges of this period in New 
England, characterized them as " slaughter pens of young 
men." It was during this term that I made my first 
appearance in print by contributing several articles of 
prose and verse to the Boston Cultivator under the signa- 
ture of "Jack." The debating society flourished, and I 
continued to edit the manuscript paper. 

My studies this term, according to the best of my 
recollection, were Davies's Trigonometry and Surveying, 
rhetoric, chemistry, geology, and astronomy. I also 
took special lessons in elocution under Professor Wilson, 
who had been trained by Professor William Russell. Mr. 
Tenney was preceptor, Mr. McKean, associate principal. 
In the study of geology I took unbounded satisfaction, 
making long tramps over the country for the purpose of 
collecting minerals. Hitchcock's Geology was the text- 
book. More than any other natural science, geology has 
had for me lifelong attractions. Wherever I have traveled 
I have made a study of geological features, and through 
modern textbooks have kept abreast of the marvelous 
development of this science. Trigonometry and survey- 
ing I took hold of with delight, probably on account of 
a thread of heredity running back to my grandmother 
French's family, the Lanes, 



THE GYMNASIUM ' 75 

I learned textbook chemistry, supplemented with a 
course of lectures and experiments by a professor of chem- 
istry from Concord. Of astronomy I learned enough to 
awaken an interest that led me to become a reader of later 
textbooks, thus following up the rapid advances made in 
modern astronomy. Burrett's Geography of the Heavens 
was the textbook in use. 

Besides the "orthodox" academy which I attended, 
there was in Pembroke a " liberal" institution known as 
the " Gymnasium," or " Military Institute," which was at 
that time under the management of Captain Alden Pat- 
ridge, formerly of the Vermont Military Academy. There 
had been for some years a bitter feud between these two 
academic institutions, and the students were not on 
speaking terms. By some accident I made the acquaint- 
ance of three students in the military school, — Joseph C. 
Morrill, Thomas McConnell, and John F. Rowell — and we 
soon brought about an era of good feeling by extending an 
invitation to the students of the rival school to attend one 
of the meetings of our debating society. The students 
came in full blaze of uniforms and brass buttons. This 
meeting led to an interchange of courtesies. In turn, they 
invited us to a dance. Thereafter there was peace as long 
as we remained at school, but soon after we left the old 
feuds were revived. Thomas McConnell, Scotch-Irish by 
descent, was a gigantic Vermonter, six feet three inches in 
height, who presented, in military uniform, a most impos- 
ing figure. After leaving Pembroke he emigrated to 
California, where he became a wealthy farmer and stock 
grower. 



76 STUDENT AND TEACHER 

Teaching in Massachusetts 

In the winter of 1849-50 I secured a school in West 
Randolph, a town adjacent to Quincy, about fifteen miles 
from Boston. This engagement I owed to the kindness of 
Nehemiah C. Berry, an attorney-at-law, who resided in 
West Randolph and had a law office in Boston. He took 
an interest in me because, when a boy in Pittsfield, he had 
been a pupil in the district school taught by my father. 

Accordingly, I filed my certificate of good moral char- 
acter from the Congregational minister of Pittsfield, passed 
an oral examination before Aaron Prescott, chairman of 
the school committee, and secured a certificate valid for 
the winter term. When I entered the law office of Mr. 
Berry, one of the school committee, he was examining 
Greene's First Lessons in Grammar, then a new book, 
which he said the committee would adopt. He handed 
the book to me, and I welcomed it as an improved method 
of teaching English grammar. 

West Randolph was then, and is now, a thriving town 
entirely devoted to the manufacture of shoes. My school 
was " District No. 1," at the south end of the village. 
The schoolhouse, in size and plan, was a counterpart of 
that on Buck Street in Pembroke, New Hampshire. My 
first innovation was to borrow some tools and provide for 
the lowering of a window from the top to secure ventila- 
tion. I found the school numbering from thirty to forty 
pupils, ungraded, and in scholarship somewhat behind the 
pupils of my New Hampshire school, from the fact that 
the endowed Stetson High School in the town had taken 
off the older pupils. My pay was sixteen dollars a month 
and board. I boarded in the family of John Belcher, the 



LECTURES 77 

district trustee, or " prudential committeeman/' who 
drew from the town treasury eight dollars a month for 
my board. As was the custom at that time, I built the 
fire and swept the schoolhouse. School was opened, as 
required by law, with the reading of the New Testament 
without note or comment by the teacher. The school 
was provided with a record book of attendance, designed 
by Horace Mann, and supplied by the State Board of 
Education. I recall nothing of interest in the uneventful 
course of the winter term. There was one girl of promise 
in the school who ciphered through Greenleaf's Arithmetic. 
As this book was new to me, I spent many wearisome 
evenings in working out the puzzling problems in " mis- 
cellaneous examples" at the end of the book. Had I 
failed on any one of these, my reputation as a scholar 
would have been ruined. 

During the winter I had the good fortune to attend a 
course of lectures by Ralph Waldo Emerson, Theodore 
Parker, and E. P. Whipple. Ralph Waldo Emerson was 
the first great thinker that I had ever heard speak, and his 
lecture on "Power" impressed me so strongly that I took 
brief notes and afterwards wrote out all of it I could 
recall. This report I still have among my papers. It is 
hardly necessary to mention that, after hearing this lec- 
ture, I read all newspaper reports of Emerson's lectures, 
and bought each succeeding volume of his essays as it 
appeared in print. To me, as to hundreds of other New 
England boys, Emerson was an inspiring power. Theodore 
Parker's lecture led me to read many of his published 
lectures and sermons. E. P. Whipple's lecture on " Web- 
ster, Clay, and Calhoun" was a masterpiece of political 
and personal characterization. This lecture, some years 



78 STUDENT AND TEACHER 

later, appeared in a volume of " Whipple's Essays." 
About this time I attended a theater for the first time 
in my life and saw that great actor, the elder Booth, as 
Shy lock in "The Merchant of Venice." 

During this term I attended a teachers' institute held for 
two days in a neighboring town. Most of the time was 
devoted to discussing methods of teaching arithmetic, par- 
ticular emphasis being placed on a new method of rinding 
the least common multiple of numbers by resolving them 
into prime factors. There were no lectures, and the pro- 
ceedings were uninteresting and unprofitable. Teachers' 
institutes, inaugurated by Horace Mann, were then in 
their infancy. Not a word was said about Horace Mann, 
or the great reforms which he had advocated during the 
eight years that he was secretary of the State Board 
of Education. Indeed, at this time, Horace Mann was 
regarded by many of the old-type schoolmasters as a 
dangerous educational fanatic. 

Near the end of the term two members of the examin- 
ing committee passed half a day giving my school an oral 
examination. One member of this committee was the 
master of the Stetson High School, and he examined my 
second class of three pupils in arithmetic. His first and 
only question was, "Give an explanation of the reason 
for inverting the divisor in division of fractions." The 
explanation given by the pupils was the identical explana- 
tion given in Greenleaf's Arithmetic, but it was pronounced 
unsatisfactory by the questioner. I took sides with the 
pupils, and the matter was dropped. The committee re- 
ported the school well taught and in good condition. 

After the close of my school, in accordance with a sug- 
gestion from my physician, I made a visit to a former 



AN ASSOCIATE PRINCIPAL 79 

Pembroke student by the name of Bailey, who lived at 
Rockport on Cape Ann. His father was a fisherman, 
through whose influence I secured, after several weeks' 
delay, a chance to "work my way" on board a mackerel 
schooner during the season. While waiting, I made a 
visit to Provincetown, and explored a part of Cape Cod. 
Our first trip was a run of three weeks off the coast, during 
which time we caught only a few barrels of fish. The sea 
air was bracing, but the diet, consisting mainly of hot 
shortcake, — a compound of corn meal, lard, and molasses, 
— was enough to ruin the digestion of an ostrich. On 
the Fourth of July, when the schooner put into Rockport, 
I told the captain he could have my "lay" of the mackerel, 
and that I would not go out on the next trip. 

I was glad to return to Pembroke during the fall term 
of the academy. My revered friend, Mr. Tenney, had 
been succeeded by Nathaniel Hills, a graduate of Dart- 
mouth, a quiet, thoughtful, and faithful teacher. He 
persuaded me to take charge of certain classes in the 
preparatory department for three hours daily, under the 
high-sounding title of "associate principal." The man- 
agement of the elocutionary and composition exercises 
was also assigned to me. Preceptor Hills also asked me 
to hear the recitations of a class of three young ladies who 
wanted to study chemistry. I told him that my knowl- 
edge of that subject was limited, and that I was not com- 
petent to teach it. "Never mind," he said, "you know 
more about it than they do, and as there is no chemical 
apparatus, all you will have to do is to hear them recite 
their textbook lessons. Besides, there is no one else to 
take the class. It is a case of necessity." I took the 
class. No great harm was done. Two of the girls cared 



80 STUDENT AND TEACHER 

nothing about the subject but took it because it was the 
conventional thing to do. The third young lady was a 
student, and she probably derived some benefit from the 
textbook. ■ 

My roommate this term was John B. Sanborn, a splen- 
did specimen of robust manhood, who began fitting for 
college when twenty-two years of age. He had an iron 
constitution and could study fourteen hours a day. We 
two constituted the entire class in Logic and in Butler's 
Analogy. We had ample time for discussion, and we 
often differed from the textbooks and the teacher. I took 
special lessons in French from the preceptress, Miss 
Carr, and special lessons in elocution from Professor 
Wilson. For the rest, I did some reading in English liter- 
ature, though debarred from reading by lamplight on 
account of the weakness of one of my eyes. I took charge 
of the closing exhibition, wrote a burlesque farce entitled 
"The Mesmerizer," and took the leading part in the play. 
On the valedictory, which was assigned to me, I put forth 
my best efforts, because I felt a presentiment that I 
should not again return to Pembroke. 

School over, I at once started off on a long foot tramp 
in the hill regions of New Hampshire. I passed through 
Salisbury, where I saw the Webster farm; climbed Mt. Kear- 
sarge, and slept one cold night on its summit in the open 
air under a granite ledge; visited a friend in New London; 
tramped around the Ossipee Mountains and Lake Winne- 
pesaukee; visited a school friend at Nottingham, and then 
walked home through Deerfield and Epsom to Pittsfield. 

During the winter of 1850 I was again employed to 
teach the school in District No. 1, West Randolph, at 
sixteen dollars a month with board. There was a new 



HORACE MANN 8l 

committeeman, John Wales, in whose family I found a 
delightful home. Before beginning school it was necessary 
for me to pass another oral examination and to file another 
certificate of good moral character. My certificate ran as 
follows : 

Randolph, 30th November, 1850. 
This certifies that Mr. John Swett of Pittsfield, N. H., has been approbated 
as a teacher in the school of District No. 1 in this Town for the winter 
term, of this current municipal year, to whom we have given duplicate cer- 
tificates. Aaron Prescott, 

Chairman of School Committee. 

My school ran smoothly, with not a ripple to break the 
unvarying monotony. At this period schools were kept 
in session five and a half days in a week, and I could find 
no opportunity to make even a trip to Boston. During 
this winter I heard a great deal of talk about Horace 
Mann, who had been appointed as congressman from 
the Plymouth district to fill the place made vacant by 
the death of John Quincy Adams.- I remember vividly 
the excitement caused in the old Bay State by his speech 
in Congress, made soon after Webster's famous seventh of 
March speech in the United States Senate. Of his great 
work as an educational reformer I knew little at that 
time. "Horace Mann, like so many of the great men of 
the Puritans, was modeled on the type of the Hebrew 
prophets," says William T. Harris. It was left for me 
many years later to read Horace Mann's official reports 
and to comprehend in some measure the sweep of his 
flaming enthusiasm. 

One day, as the term was drawing to a close, my school 
was visited by a dignified gentleman who quietly sat in his 
chair and looked on for half a day. After expressing great 



82 STUDENT AND TEACHER 

satisfaction with my manner of teaching, he offered me a 
ten months' school at Ipswich, with a salary of two hun- 
dred and forty dollars a year and board. The offer was a 
tempting one, but I declined it. I was slowly beginning 
to face the future. Debarred from the college course by 
delicate health and a chronic weakness of one of my eyes, 
I could see no inducement whatever to engage longer in 
teaching. After the close of my winter term I bade 
good-by to Randolph and returned to my home in an un- 
certain and unsettled state of mind. Finally I deter- 
mined to go to Oregon or California by way of Cape Horn, 
and my Pembroke school friend, Joseph C. Morrill, agreed 
to go with me; but my mother, unknown to me, pleaded 
so hard with him not to go, that he yielded to her entreat- 
ies, and the project fell through. It was probably for- 
tunate for both of us that our plan was given up, though 
I did not think so at the time. 

After this failure I decided to begin the study of medi- 
cine, the medical profession being the only one for which I 
had any inclination. But when I called on our village doctor 
and asked if I could begin to read medical books in his office, 
he said he was making arrangements to go to California 
for a two years' absence, and he thought I had better go 
along with him and study medicine after our return. 
Accordingly I tried to secure a ticket on the same steamer 
with him, but failed, as the tickets had all been sold long 
in t advance. There was nothing for me to do but bide my 
time, and I decided in the meanwhile to attend Russell's 
Normal Institute at Reed's Ferry, on the Merrimac 
River, a few miles below the city of Manchester, where I 
remained for six months during the spring and winter 
terms. The course in rhetoric, grammar, composition, 



PROFESSOR WILLIAM RUSSELL 83 

and elocution, under the instruction of Professor William 
Russell, was of inestimable value to me. The full notes 
of many of Professor Russell's lectures and exercises on 
rhetoric, composition, and word study are still treasured 
relics of my school days. Dana P. Colburn gave the 
method lessons in arithmetic. Attention to good read- 
ing and the study of English literature was a character- 
istic feature of this institution. Here I read two books of 
Virgil, took lessons in French from Anna Russell, and 
edited the school paper. - 

For several years I had been a contributor of fugitive 
pieces of prose and verse to the Boston Cultivator, an 
agricultural weekly journal having a literary department 
in which young writers were invited to try their appren- 
tice pens. I have a bulky scrapbook of these early con- 
tributions which are still of interest to me, as showing a 
gradual improvement in style. As a supplement to my 
academic drill in rhetoric and composition, this miscella- 
neous work led up to a fair degree of readiness in writing. 
I am glad to find that the pieces of verse, as I look at 
them now, though not in any sense ranking as poetry, 
neither " broke the legs of melody nor docked the tail of 
rhyme." 

Professor William Russell was born in Scotland. He had 
graduated from Glasgow University, and was one of that 
notable group of educators that clustered around Horace 
Mann during his great work in educational reform. He 
was one of the editors of the first school journal published 
in Boston, and one of the active promoters of state normal 
schools. He was the author of a number of excellent 
schoolbooks, among wh'ch are Russell's Normal Training, 
Russell's Elocution, Studies on Words, and the American 



84 STUDENT AND TEACHER 

School Reader. Under his tuition I was brought into 
personal contact with the most enlightened educational 
thought of that time. For many years in after life I 
continued to receive from him letters of approval and 
encouragement. 

At the end of the spring term the honor of giving the 
valedictory was conferred on me. An extract from this 
address on " Scholarship and Action" is of incidental 
interest to myself as showing how I looked at the world 
when twenty-one years of age, at the close of my academic 
education. It also affords an illustration of the florid 
rhetoric of youth. 

The true scholar must be a doer as well as a thinker. All great men 
shaped each burning thought into some glorious deed. He who thinks but 
never acts, who stores up knowledge which he does not use, is no more a 
scholar than an ass loaded down with an Alexandrian library. When the 
scholar goes into the world, he is measured by what he does, not by what 
he knows. Those who take the lead, who hold responsible stations, who 
mold public opinion, are not always the men of the greatest acquirements 
in book knowledge; they are men of action, who, like Andrew Jackson, do 
not hesitate to take the responsibility. Life is a struggle for power; the 
members of society are engaged in a continual contest for mastery. Every 
newcomer is met at the threshold of society; there is a conflict of man with 
man, and he who can bring his knowledge to bear with the greatest ease 
will gain the victory. Hence, the mere book student often finds himself 
overreached by those who are far inferior in point of attainments. Let 
the student, then, strive, not so much to pile up facts in the storehouse of 
memory, as to acquire the power of ready thought. 

Soon after leaving Russell's Normal Institute I made 
another effort to get started for California. This time 
my former roommate at Pembroke, John B. Sanborn, 
agreed to go with me,, and we tried to secure steamer 
tickets by way of Panama, but failed on account of the 
rush of gold seekers. Sanborn then decided to enter Dart- 



TO CALIFORNIA 85 

mouth College and to study law. Five years later he 
emigrated to St. Paul, Minnesota; he became a leading 
lawyer there, and served with distinction in the Union 
army during the war, retiring as brevet Major General of 
volunteers. I decided to go to California in a sailing 
vessel, " 'round the Horn," hoping that a long sea voyage 
might improve my health and strengthen my eyes. Dur- 
ing the summer I persuaded Joseph C. Morrill, of the 
Pembroke Military Institute, to go with me by offering 
to advance him part of the money for his outfit. We 
secured our passage in the ship Revere, paying for our fare 
two hundred dollars each. 

I had no intention of teaching in California, as I con- 
fidently expected to return in three years and take up the 
study of medicine; but I took the precaution to secure 
from Professor Russell a general letter of introduction 
which might be used in case of necessity. It was fortu- 
nate that I did so, for, unknown to me, my six months' 
training under William Russell had determined my life 
work. 



CHAPTER VI 

GOLD MINING DAYS IN CALIFORNIA 

On the fifteenth of September, 1852, the merchant 
ship Revere sailed out of Boston Harbor, bound for San 
Francisco, with seven cabin passengers, Mr. Morrill, 
myself, and five others, — a man with his wife and three 
children. The voyage of four and a half months was 
tedious and monotonous. We put into no port, and 
sighted land in the distance only twice, — once off Cape 
St. Roque, and once off Cape Horn, until we caught sight 
of the "heads" at the entrance of the Golden Gate. 

We beguiled the close imprisonment of a long sea voy- 
age in various ways. The first month out we talked with 
one another and read all the literature aboard the ship; 
then I took to reading Shakespeare and Scott, and to writ- 
ing long letters for the Boston Cultivator. 

One hundred and thirty-five days after the Revere was 
towed out of Boston Harbor, a San Francisco pilot stepped 
on board of her, and we heard that Franklin Pierce had 
been elected president and that Daniel Webster was dead. 1 

1 At the time of the presidential election in 1852 I was off Cape Horn, 
and consequently lost my vote, which would have been cast for Pierce had 
I been at home in New Hampshire, where I had often heard him make 
pleasing political speeches. My first vote for president of the United 
States was cast for John C. Fremont in 1856, since which time I have never 
missed an election, and have not failed to cast my ballot for the regular 
candidate of the Republican Party. Neither have I ever failed to vote at 
every state election, or city election, or special local election. Generally, 
too, I have turned out to vote at primary elections. 

86 




John Swett 
at twenty-two years of age 

Reproduced from a daguerreotype taken in 
Boston in 1852, shortly before. he started for 
California " 'round the Horn." 



87 



88 GOLD MINING DAYS IN CALIFORNIA 

Next day, February i, 1853, I went ashore and wan- 
dered about San Francisco with the mingled sensations 
that come over a country boy when he finds himself an 
unknown atom of humanity in a bustling city. I called on 
the Reverend S. H. Willey, pastor of the Happy Valley 
Presbyterian Church, and presented a letter of intro- 
duction to him from a Congregational minister in New 
Hampshire. I was kindly received and was given a letter 
to Mr. J. W. Douglas, editor of the Pacific, a religious 
weekly publication. He secured a promise from me to 
send him occasional articles, and the files of that paper 
for 1853 to 1858 show that the pledge was kept. I called 
on the city superintendent of schools, Thomas J. Nevins, 
to secure some statistics about the public schools, telling 
him that I was a teacher and a correspondent for an 
Eastern newspaper. My reception was rather chilling, 
and I got little information that I wanted. 

After a week's stay in San Francisco, without making 
any effort to find employment, I took the Sacramento 
River steamer, Thomas Hunt, for Marysville, on my way 
into the mines, not with the expectation of " making a 
strike," but with the hope of getting health from the 
rough life and hard work of gold mining. On my way I 
called on Dr. O. P. Warren, the Pittsfield physician with 
whom a year before I had planned to go to California. 
He had taken up a squatter's claim of one hundred and 
sixty acres on what he supposed was government land, six 
miles south of Marysville on the " slough," near the 
"Hock Farm" of General John A. Sutter. I found him 
living in a squatter's shanty, practicing medicine among 
the surrounding settlers, most of whom were suffering 
from chills and fever. He had great expectations of the 



ARRIVAL AT THE MINES 89 

future value of the land, in which he was doomed to be 
disappointed. His quarter section proved to be part of 
the Sutter grant, and a year later he moved to San 
Francisco and resumed medical practice. He never 
returned to Pittsfield, but a year or two later sent for his 
family, and lived in San Francisco and Oakland to the 
day of his death. 

After a short visit with Dr. Warren, I left with him my 
books and other superfluous baggage, packed my blankets 
on my back, and started on foot for the little trading 
post of White and Nutter at Potter's Bar on the North 
Fork of Feather River, about thirty miles from Marysville. 
On my way I passed through Oroville, then a deserted 
mining camp, once famous for its rich diggings in '49 
and '50. 

When I reached my destination, I was warmly wel- 
comed by my two friends, Thomas W. Nutter and James 
E. White, with whom I had attended common school and 
academy in Pittsfield. They were keeping a trading post 
of miners' supplies, and were evidently doing a good busi- 
ness. The outlook they gave me was not particularly 
encouraging. It had been a hard winter of heavy rains in 
California. The Sacramento valley had been flooded, 
and Sacramento City was a scene of desolation. Provi- 
sions of all kinds were scarce and high on account of the 
difficulty of transportation. Thousands of miners were 
out of work and out of money. A heavy storm came on 
and the rain poured down without cessation for five days. 
The river rose forty feet in two days, and poured through 
the rocky canyon of the Feather River with terrific fury, 
bringing down uprooted pine trees and driftwood from 
mountain flumes. The Sacramento valley became an 



90 GOLD MINING DAYS IN CALIFORNIA 

inland sea, and Sacramento City was flooded for the 
second time during the year. 

After this rainstorm was over, I secured a miner's 
outfit and went to the Morris Ravine, a decayed mining 
camp five miles distant, which had yielded, in the days of 
'49 and '50, several millions of dollars from its rich placer 
diggings. This ravine lies between two basaltic table 
mountains and was evidently the channel of an ancient 
river before the period of the great lava flow in this 
mountain region. The diggings had been "worked out" 
in early days, but a few miners still remained, mostly 
engaged in working over the " tailings" a second or third 
time. I soon came across a good-natured Dutchman, 
six feet two in height, who kindly allowed me to spread 
my blankets in his cabin and cook my meals at his 
fireplace. 

Then I looked around to find work. Hearing of a 
Scotchman two miles out of camp who wanted a partner 
to help sink a prospecting shaft, I immediately hunted 
him up. He admitted me into partnership on equal 
shares. We began work at once, he digging in the shaft 
while I ran the windlass, hauling up sand, gravel, and 
water in a large bucket. We sunk a vertical shaft fifteen 
or twenty feet, to " bedrock," and struck gravel that 
promised to pay for working. Heavy rains came on and 
stopped work for a week. Then we began to run a drift 
from the bed of the creek toward the shaft where we had 
struck gold. Joe Donaldson, my partner, was now taken 
down with a severe attack of chills and fever, and as he 
had no medicine I set out on foot to Marysville, forty 
miles away, to get a supply of quinine that I had left with 
Dr. Warren. On my return with medicine, Donaldson 



MY FIRST AND LAST STRIKE 9 1 

was soon able to resume work, and for a week we took 
out of our claim an average of two dollars a day. 

One day, Donaldson being sick, I worked alone, struck 
a u pocket," and cleaned up eighty dollars, the first and 
last strike I ever made in mining. Of course I divided 
this sum with my partner. This strike so elated me that 
I stopped work earlier than usual. It was fortunate that 
I did so, for in half an hour after I left the drift the bank 
caved down and buried the mouth of the tunnel under 
twenty feet of earth. Had I remained at work a little 
longer that day, I should have been instantly crushed out 
of existence. We afterwards cleared off the debris, but 
the claim paid so little that we soon gave it up. 

In a pocket memorandum and account book I find a 
few entries that show the daily routine of my life at this 
time. 

April 11, two of us worked all day and cleaned up $6.00. 

April 12, $3.00. 

April 14, Donaldson sick, worked alone, $1.00. 

April 15, alone, 50 cents. 

April 16, two of us, $3.00. 

April 18, bank caved in. Three days' work in clearing off dirt. 

April 21, three of us, $20.00. 

April 22, another cave of the bank, claim given up. 

April 23, face and hands swollen from the effects of "poison oak." 

April 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 30, laid up in misery. 

May 1st, 2d, 3d, 4th, unable to work. 

On May 5, in company with George B. Davis and 
Dennis Hite, two New Hampshire men, I began washing 
out the old "tailings" along the creek. Our board cost 
us about fifty cents a day each. Our diet consisted 
chiefly of tea and coffee, stewed beans, bread, and occa- 
sionally a little beef or ham. Potatoes were a luxury we 
could not afford, as they cost from fifteen to twenty cents 



92 GOLD MINING DAYS IN CALIFORNIA 

a pound. Butter was unknown; even pork and beef were 
hard to get and high in price. We baked our bread in a 
large iron Dutch oven and stewed our beans in a camp 
kettle. I soon learned to make bread equal to the very 
best French bread. Our bill of fare was short, but the 
diet was substantial and wholesome, and we thrived upon 
it. Most of the cooking fell to me because I proved to be 
the best cook. My memorandum runs as follows: 

May 5, 50 cents; May 6, 75 cents; May 7, 50 cents; May 8, 50 cents; 
May 9, not even color; May 10, 50 cents; May 11 to 15, nothing. 

We gave up our claim and went to the Potter Ravine, 
where we camped out, slept on the ground, and cooked our 
meals in the open air over a camp fire. 

On the first day the three of us washed out $3.40; May 22, three of us 
cleaned up $54.00, a good day's work; May 24, worked alone, the other two 
men being sick, cleaned up $10.00. May 25, three of us, $4.00; May 26, 
three of us, 25 cents. Claim worked out, no more water. May 31, packed 
blankets to Morris Ravine and worked with Davis and Hite. June 1, three 
of us, $29.00; June 3, three of us, $3.00; June 4, $6.00; June 5, water gave out. 

After the failure of water there was no further surface 
mining to be done in that region for six months, or until 
the return of winter rains. Under the sharp spur of neces- 
sity four of us — • Davis, Hite, Burroughs, and myself — 
planned a prospecting tour to the headwaters of the 
Feather River, far up in the mountains. As Burroughs 
was a veteran miner, we made him our guide and leader. 
He knew of a river "bar" that had never been worked out. 
We rolled up our blankets, tied on our picks and rations, 
and slung the whole over our backs, each weighted down 
with forty pounds of baggage. Shade of Don Quixote! 
What a party of innocents we were ! How we reached our 



AN IMAGINARY EL DORADO . 93 

imaginary El Dorado is best told by a few extracts from 
my home letters in the Boston Cultivator. 

Board Ranch, June 6, 1853. 

At the close of a hot day, after footing it for twenty-five miles under a 

burning sun over a dusty road, the little ranch where we are resting, nestled 

among the trees, seems very inviting. I send these "home letters," instead 

of keeping a diary. My nervous energy has mostly gone into the heels of 

my boots, leaving very little to ooze out at the point of a pen. Early this 

morning I left the Norris Ravine bound for the mountains, to see the white 

elephant. . . . On our way we passed through BidwelPs Bar, a little 

trading post for miners, where there is a ferry for crossing the Feather River. 

The miners have worked up through the center of the town, undermining 

houses and streets. This place is the center of travel into the "Northern 

Mines." 

Jack. 

June 8, 1853, Little Grass Valley — We are on the south fork of the 
Feather River, about seventy-five miles from Marysville. Yesterday the 
road along the divide ran through one continuous forest of sugar pines and 
firs, straight as gun barrels, and more than a hundred feet in height. Pass- 
ing through Forbestown, where a thousand miners were at work, we met a 
large number coming down from the mountains in search of work. We 
reached snow this afternoon, and its cool carpet was very grateful to our 
blistered feet. In this little valley the snow^is just melting away and the 
green grass is springing up. The frogs are croaking, and everything reminds 

me of New England. 

Jack. 

— Little Rich Bar, Middle Fork oe Feather River, June n. 
Leaving Grass Valley early this morning, we crossed the south fork and 
followed a mule trail to the Middle Feather. On the dividing ridge between 
these rivers we passed over large snowfields from ten to twenty feet deep. 
We missed the -trail, struck into Onion Valley, and followed down the creek 
to the Middle Feather, about three miles above our point of destination. 
Then we worked our way down the rugged canyon of the Feather, climbing 
high ridges and plunging down ravines, clinging like monkeys to the jagged 
points of slate. After three hours of slow and toilsome progress we reached 
Little Rich Bar and stood on the fabulous diggings to which our gray- 
headed guide had taken us, in one of the wildest, roughest, and most desolate 
sections of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. But we found there twenty-five 
miners who had taken up every foot of land on the small river bench or bar. 



94 GOLD MINING DAYS IN CALIFORNIA 

The miners shared their supper with us, but not their claims. Next day 
my partners were too stiff and sore to move out of camp. Having been 
accustomed to long foot-tramps, our forced march did not disable me, though 
I was the least robust of the party. So I started out alone to prospect along 
the river. The geological formation of this section consisted of granite and 
slate intersected by veins of quartz. I washed out many pans of sand and 
gravel along the river channels, but secured only a few tiny scales of float 
gold, not worth working. Rich Bar itself is a shelf or bench at a bend of the 
river, thirty or forty feet above high- water mark. It must have been at one 
time the bed of the stream. A few of the claims seemed to be paying well, 
but most of the miners were sinking shafts and had not struck the bedrock 
on which gold is found. Provisions are now brought by mules, but until 
within a few days the miners packed on their own backs all their supplies 
from Little Grass Valley, twelve miles distant. For several days we pros- 
pected along the river but found nothing, not even the color of gold. Then 
we tried to buy a claim, but prices were too high for our capital. I told my 
partners that I was tired of chasing rainbows to find a pot of gold, and that 
I had made up my mind to go to San Francisco. They wanted to go higher 
up into the mountains, and we parted company. T 

— Valley of the Feather River, near Marysville, Julys. 
Dear Mr. Editor: — I went into the mountains expecting my stay would 
be short. But how did I get here ? Well, one morning I came to the conclu- 
sion that I had seen the elephant and the circus, and I began a retrograde 
movement, leaving my partners to hunt for grizzly bears. I rolled up my 
blankets, packed them on my back, left my pick, pan, and shovel with my 
friends, and started out alone. It is easier to get into a scrape than it is to 
get out of one. It is easier to go down into the deep canyons of Feather 
River than it is to climb out of them. After toiling up the rude trail for three 
miles to the divide, I found the snow melted off, and there were no traces of 
a pathway. I struck out first in one direction, then in another, and found 
myself lost in the chaparral. I wandered blindly around until nearly sun- 
set, when I stumbled across a miner's rough cabin, and in the cabin a solitary 
miner who bade me welcome to a supper and a bunk. In the morning he 
went with me to the trail, pointed out the direction, and I have held him in 
grateful remembrance ever since. I may as well mention here that my 

partners came over this same trail a week later. T 

^ Jack. 

On my way out of the mountains I picked up a job for 
two days at Buffalo Ranch, mowing and raking hay in a 



END OF MY MINING ADVENTURES 95 

little hayfield on a small patch of level land. On the first 
day of July I reached the cabin of my friend Dr. Warren, 
on Sutter's Slough, near Marysville, and on July 12 I 
took passage on the steamer Senator for San Francisco. 

Thus ended my five months' stay in the mines. I 
should gladly have remained there longer if I could have 
found any way of making a living. As it was, I had a 
small emergency fund of about one hundred and twenty- 
five dollars carefully strapped around my waist to be used 
in case of sickness. As I look back on these mining days 
my only regret is that they did not last longer. They 
toned up my health and strength and gave me a taste of 
pioneer life, something for which I had an hereditary longing 
when a boy. During all this time I had been a regular 
correspondent of the Boston Cultivator, and my letters and 
other articles, carefully preserved by my mother in a scrap- 
book, make a bulky volume. In addition to the Culti- 
vator letters, I made numerous contributions of prose and 
verse to the Pacific, a weekly paper published in San Fran- 
cisco, the organ of the Congregational church, and sent 
several contributions of prose and verse to the Knicker- 
bocker Magazine. 

The fact was that in 1853 the r i° n surface or placer 
diggings had been worked out. The whole state was over- 
run with men tramping in search of work. The days of 
rich strikes and reckless dissipation had come to an end. 
The men that I worked with were steady, temperate, and 
economical, from force of habit as well as from necessity. 
Of course there was some of the driftwood of humanity 
floating around in the mines, as well as in the cities, but 
the great majority of the miners were steady, hard-work- 
ing men, struggling for a competence to enable them to 



g6 GOLD MINING DAYS IN CALIFORNIA 

return to their homes in the East. As for myself, I was 
exposed to no temptations whatever. I used neither whis- 
key nor tobacco. I never played a game of cards, even 
without stakes. I lived on a diet of Spartan symplicity. 
In our camp there was little profanity and no vulgarity. 
So far as moral conduct was concerned, all of us lived 
up to the rigid standard of an old Puritan community, 
save that we did not go to church on Sunday, there being 
neither minister nor meeting within twenty miles of us. 

I am tempted to close this sketch of my life in the 
mines by " some verses" written in the Morris Ravine 
and published in the Boston Cultivator. 

ROUND THE CAMP FIRE 

Leave the "sluice" and "torn" untended, 

Shadows darken on the river, 
In the canyon day is ended, 

Far above the red "rays quiver. 
Lay aside the bar and spade, 

Let the pickax rest from drifting, 
See how much the claim has paid, 

Where the gold dust has been sifting. 

Tell no tales of wizard charm 

In the myths of ages olden, 
When the sorcerer's potent arm 

Turned at will all things to golden; 
Pick and spade are magic rods, 

Toil and industry diviners, 
Drawing gold from sand and sods 

Touched by brawny arms of miners. 

Stretched around the supper fire, 

Hear the iron kettle steaming, 
While the sharpness of desire 

Lulls into luxurious dreaming; 



ROUND THE CAMP FIRE 97 

On the "oven" heap the coals 

Till it seems a dragon waking, 
For a dozen hungry souls 

Wait for bread within it baking. 

On the ground the tin plates spread, 

Pour the tea out, strong and stronger; 
From the "Dutchman" draw the bread, 

We can wait for it no longer; 
Roll it out upon the ground, 

Pray the gods to be propitious, 
Never loaf before was found 

With an odor so delicious. 

Break it up with brawny hand, 

Pass it round with labor's blessing; 
Now the waiting men look bland, 

Hungry miners need no pressing. 
Pass the ham around this way, 

Quick ! before it all is taken, 
Hang philosophy, we say, 

If we only save our bacon ! 

Spread the blankets on the ground, 

We must toil again to-morrow; 
Labor brings us slumbers sound 

No luxurious couch can borrow. 
Through the dark-topped, sighing pines 

Watch the moon "with white fire laden," 
Fall asleep to dream of mines, 

Home, or wife, or child, or maiden. 

As the needle, frail and shivering, 

On the ocean wastes afar, 
Veering, changing, trembling, quivering, 

Settles on the polar star, 
So in souls of those who roam, 

Love's magnetic fires are burning; 
To the loved ones left at home, 

Throbbing hearts are ever turning. 

Feather River, 1853 Jack. 



98 GOLD MINING DAYS IN CALIFORNIA 

Looking for Work 

When I arrived in San Francisco I hunted up my school 
friend, Joseph C. Morrill, whom I found at work on a 
milk ranch on the outskirts of the city of San Francisco. 
Then I applied to an intelligence office, and was sent to 
work for Thomas Hayes, who had a large vegetable garden 
in Hayes's Valley, near the present site of the John Swett 
Grammar School. For thirty days I was kept at spad- 
ing, hoeing, weeding, and planting, from six o'clock in the 
morning until seven in the evening. My boss was a tough 
and muscular Irishman, and it nearly broke my back to keep 
up with him. One month's experience in gardening was 
quite enough; I thanked Mr. Hayes for his kindness, took 
my wages, twenty-five dollars, packed my blankets, and 
moved on as a tramp in search of work. 

Next I went to the old Mission of San Jose, carrying a 
letter of introduction from the editor of the Pacific to 
Mr. E. L. Beard, the owner of the Mission ranch. He 
kindly set me at work immediately, and here I remained 
for two months. Among the twenty or thirty men at 
work on this farm were two college graduates, four teach- 
ers, and one lawyer. One of the large rooms in an old 
adobe house was fitted up with bunks for a sleeping room; 
but it was swarming with millions of bloodthirsty fleas, 
and after a trial of one night I slept in the open air, on the 
ground under a fig tree in the old Mission garden. But 
even there the fleas followed me. 

After working a month, hearing that a district school 
near Alvarado was in want of a teacher, I hunted up the 
head trustee, — a Congregational minister from New Eng- 
land, — passed an examination exactly like those that I 



LOOKING FOR WORK 99 

had passed in Massachusetts, and secured a certificate; 
but a young woman living in the district got the school, 
and I went back to work. Soon after, my friend Mr. 
Morrill, who had just been appointed teacher of the Spring 
Valley school in San Francisco, wrote to me to come to 
the city and pass an examination for a certificate, as he 
thought I could secure a school. Accordingly I went to 
the city, was orally examined, in company with a dozen 
other men, in reading, spelling, arithmetic, and grammar, 
and was given a certificate, " valid for one year, if not 
sooner revoked." I called on William H. O'Grady, super- 
intendent of public schools, and applied for the first 
vacancy that might occur. The credentials which I filed 
with the superintendent read as follows: 

(1) Merrimack Normal Institute. 

Mr. John Swett has been, for" several years, a member of this Seminary, 
and has been uniformly distinguished by exemplary deportment, assiduous 
application, rapid advancement, and high attainments. Mr. Swett's noble 
talents and his excellent habits indicate emphatically the individual whose 
success is sure in the peculiar duties and business of instruction. We part 
with him reluctantly; and we can but hope that he will obtain such a position 
in life as his merits entitle him to fill. I may add that Mr. Swett's influence 
on younger minds cannot fail of encouraging the best results on the dispo- 
sition and character, as his own traits of personal character have won the 
universal esteem of teachers and students here. He carries with him our 
best wishes for his prosperity in whatever career of life he may enter. 

William Russell, 
Merrimack, N. H., 21st July, 1852. Principal. 

(2) Letter from N. C. Berry, Esq. 
To whom it may concern: — 

The subscriber is very well acquainted with Mr. John Swett of Pittsfield 
in the County of Merrimack and State of New Hampshire. I knew his 
lamented father. He was an excellent teacher, and in my school days I was 
faithfully flogged by him at school. Thanks to him for it, and peace to his 
ashes. And now here is a worthy and only son of him. He has been bred 



100 GOLD MINING DAYS IN CALIFORNIA 

to letters and fitted for a teacher of youth in some of our best New England 
academies. He has a thorough knowledge of the English language, acquired 
by long and persevering study. I am informed that he has a good knowledge 
of the Latin language, but how extensive that knowledge is I am at present 
unable to say, never having had an opportunity, personally, to examine him 
in this department. During the years of 1849 an d 1850 I employed him to 
instruct a large and interesting school in Randolph, Mass. He succeeded 
in giving the best satisfaction, and in bearing off the palm for keeping the 
best school, from a dozen of his associates in the same town; for confirmation 
of this statement, reference is had to the printed report of the School Com- 
mittee of those years. He has been an associate teacher in the Pembroke 
Academy for some time past, and as I learn with entire success. He sustains 
an excellent moral character, with habits and a deportment suitable for a 
teacher of youth. Whatever institution of learning shall have the good 
fortune to employ him for an instructor, will find him all that he pretends 
to be, and one among the very few of his profession who are in fact qualified 
for their business. 

N. C. Berry, 
Attorney and Counselor at Law. 
Office, 20 Court Street, Boston, Mass. 

(3) Letter from the Editors of the Boston Cultivator: 
Our dear Young Friend: — It is with sorrow that we hear of your inten- 
tion to leave the land of your birth for the untried scenes of the golden 
sands of Eldorado! and this feeling is, we confess, not entirely disinterested, 
for from the day of your first "Communication" for the columns of the 
Boston Cultivator have we considered you one of the very best contribu- 
tors, and to whom we were indebted for a large amount of excellent and 
original matter, both prose and verse. 

Will you accept our best thanks for your valuable services in the cause of 
the Cultivator, and our fervent prayers for your health and success in your 
future undertakings. Nothing will afford us greater pleasure than to hear 
of your prosperity, while the pages of the Cultivator will stand open, ready 
to receive with thankfulness whatever you may please to consign to our care. 
May God bless you, our dear and young friend, and if it be in our power to 
serve you, please command us, and believe us most truly and affectionately 
yours, 

Otis Brewer, Proprietor, 
James Pedder, Editor, 

Boston Cultivator. 

Boston Cultivator Office, 13th September, 1852. 



SECURING A CERTIFICATE IOI 

(4) From Nathaniel Hills, Principal of Pembroke Academy, 1850. 

This certifies that the bearer, Mr. John Swett, has formerly been a mem- 
ber of the Pembroke Academy in this place. As a scholar he always took 
a high standing in the numerous classes with which he was connected. More 
recently he has been employed as a teacher in the same institution, the duties 
of which office he has discharged with much credit to himself and entire 
satisfaction to the board of Trustees and members of the Academy. He is 
a young man of great energy of mind, possessed of a good moral character, 
and is cheerfully recommended as a young gentleman worthy the confidence 
of all such as may wish to employ him as a teacher. 

Nathaniel Hills, 

Principal. 
Pembroke, N. H., November 16, 1850. 

(5) From the Reverend Samuel H. Willey, Pastor of the First Presby- 

terian Church, 1853. 

San Francisco, Nov. 1, 1853. 
To the Hon. Board of Education, San Francisco : — 

I herewith forward the name of Mr. J. Sweit to you as candidate for the 
place of teacher in a City school. 

I will not add a word in commendation of him, as the accompanying letters 
are amply sufficient on that point. 

I believe him to be a teacher possessing merit of the first order, and con- 
sequently take pleasure in presenting him as candidate for a school in my 
adopted City. 

I am, gentlemen, 

Yr. Obt. Servt., 
S. A. Willey. 

Having secured my certificate, I returned to farm work 
at the Mission of San Jose. An extract from one of my 
home letters to the Boston Cultivator, dated San Jose 
Mission, September 13, 1853, shows my outlook at that 
time : — 

One year ago to-day I left New England for the shores of the Pacific. I 
came here, not with the hope of gaining wealth, not with high expectations, 
but with the hope of regaining health. I have had some dark days and some 
sunny days, but have never been disheartened. The year has been a long 



102 GOLD MINING DAYS IN CALIFORNIA 

one, for we measure time, not by hours and days, but by events. I looked 

forward to a "good time coming." Like Mr. Micawber, I am waiting for 

"something to turn up." 

Yours truly, Jack. 

Not long after this letter was written something did 
turn up, for I received a letter from Mr. Morrill stating 
that I was appointed as an assistant teacher in the public 
school on Washington Street in the basement of the 
Baptist church, of which Mr. Ellis H. Holmes was prin- 
cipal. Then I thanked Mr. Beard for his kindness in 
giving me employment, and took an order on a commission 
house in San Francisco for the amount of my wages, fifty 
dollars, together with one hundred and twenty dollars that 
I had deposited in his office for safe keeping while I was at 
work for him. After some delay in cashing this order, 
I was fortunate enough to secure my money from Mr. 
Beard's agent a few days before the announcement of his 
failure. Mr. Beard was an able business man, but he 
carried on extensive farming operations, and a sudden fall 
in the prices of wheat and other farm products swept him 
down in the general wreck. 

I arrived at San Francisco only to find that the Board 
of Education had decided not to assign me as an assist- 
ant in the Washington school, holding out the hope, how- 
ever, that I would be appointed to the first vacancy in the 
department. Mr. Morrill and myself rented two small 
rooms, furnished them with primitive simplicity, and set 
up housekeeping, taking our dinners at the restaurants 
and cooking the other meals ourselves. During a month 
of waiting I visited the various public schools, made some 
good friends, and busied myself in writing letters for the 
Boston Cultivator about scenes in San Francisco. Among 



RAINY DAYS IN SAN FRANCISCO 1 03 

these letters I find in my scrapbook a realistic picture, 
in rime, of weather conditions at the beginning of the 
rainy season in California. It is dragged out of obscurity 
only to show that, though I was waiting on the anxious 
seat, I managed to keep up my spirits. 

RAINY DAYS IN SAN FRANCISCO 



The San Francisco streets to-day 
Are in a sloppy, muddy way, 
And dripping mortals sadly say, 

"The weather's bad!" 
Go into any public place, 
A frown lies scowling on each face; 
Of fun there is not left a trace, 

'Tis very sad! 

II 

A Chinaman stepped in a hole — 
He looked and acted very droll — 
And, burrowing like a blinded mole, 

Sank out of view; 
All save his tail of braided hair, 
Which stood a solemn warning there 
To all who moved in upper air, 

To mind their queue ! 

Ill 

A drayman drove into the mire 

And cursed his team with heathen ire. 

Down, down he went, his eyes on fire, 

Till quenched in water; 
He met the fate of Phaeton, 
That reckless driver of the sun, 
Who rushed his horses on the run 

To wreck and slaughter, 



104 GOLD MINING DAYS IN CALIFORNIA 

IV 

An organ grinder killing songs 

With power of forty thousand gongs — 

These grinders should with fire and tongs 

Be chased to Hades — 
Fell down a man-trap yawning wide, 
And music with its master died; 
A pandemonium was his pride, 

And there his shade is! 

V 

A Yankee, so the papers said, 
Was fished up out of water, dead; 
They thought the vital spark had fled 

And stole his money — 
He started up in wild surprise; 
Exclaiming as he tried to rise, 
"Don't pick my pockets, darn your eyes, 

The weather's funny!" 

VI 

The newsboys hurry through the showers, 
At morning and all other hours, 
Crying with more than mortal powers, 

"The Daily Times!" 
Under the eyes of all they meet 
They thrust their wet and dripping sheet — 
It makes the misery quite complete — 

Such howling crimes! 

VII 

The reeking sheets contain no news, 
They seem made up of rain and dews, 
The printer must have had the blues 

Or else the "hypoes"; 
But then such horrid rainy weather! 
It makes folks all grow glum together, 
And geese and goosequills drop a feather; 
— Blame not the "typoes." 
1853 Jack. 



CHAPTER VII 

THE MAKING OF A GRAMMAR SCHOOL IN SAN FRANCISCO 

My opportunity came soon in an unexpected manner. 
The principal of the Rincon School, who had been in 
charge of the school only sixty days, had some serious 
troubles in matters of discipline; the big boys rebelled, and 
he suddenly resigned. The superintendent assigned me to 
the vacancy in November, 1853. Naturally enough the 
ringleaders of this small school of sixty boys and girls 
tried their hand on the new teacher, but the decisive 
manner in which one was punished on the spot, and 
another ordered out of school not to return, quelled an 
incipient mutiny, and there was no further trouble about 
order and discipline. This school was at that time held in 
a small rented house, planted in the middle of a sand bank 
on the corner of First and Folsom streets. To the original 
shanty there had been attached a shed-like addition for 
the primary children. There was neither blackboard nor 
map in this primitive schoolroom. The only apparatus 
consisted of a wooden water pail and a battered tin dipper, 
from which the children drank water brought from a well 
not far distant, the owner of which allowed the boys to 
draw one bucket of water a day. There was a small table 
for the teacher, and one rickety chair. The school chil- 
dren furnished their own ink bottles, their pens, and their 
paper. Compared with this wretched makeshift of a 
schoolhouse ? the Pittsfield school building in which I 

105 



106 THE MAKING OF A GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

learned to read and write and cipher was a palace. My 
department numbered thirty boys and girls, and the pri- 
mary room in charge of Miss Bain had about the same 
number. 

The organization of the city schools under state law 
had begun about two years before this time with the ap- 
pointment, by the common council, of a board of edu- 
cation and a city superintendent, Thomas J. Nevins, who 
came to San Francisco from New York City as agent of 
the American Tract Society. 

But the preliminary efforts to start a public school had 
begun in 1847, when the town council (Ayuntamiento) 
built a small one-room schoolhouse on a corner of the 
town plaza (now Portsmouth Square). In this building a 
few citizens, assembled in "town meeting," elected the 
first public school committee in California, consisting of 
seven members. A school was opened early in 1848, with 
six pupils taught by Thomas Douglass, a graduate of 
Yale. This was a public school, supported by tuition 
fees, but indigent children were to be admitted as charity 
pupils, the town council agreeing to pay four hundred 
dollars a year towards its maintenance. The discovery of 
gold broke up this school soon after it opened, and school- 
master Douglass drifted away, with hundreds of other gold 
hunters, into the mountains. 

In December, 1849, Mr. and Mrs. John C. Pel ton 
arrived from the state of Maine and opened a private 
tuition school, "free to the children of the poor," which 
was made a free public school by ordinance of the com- 
mon council, April 8, 1850, and John C. Pel ton remained 
in charge of it until September 25, 1851, when it was 
reorganized under the state law, by a new city ordinance 



THE BEGINNING IN SAN ERANCISCO 107 

which provided for a city board of education and a city 
school superintendent. 

One of the first teachers elected by this new board was 
James Denman (December 17, 1851), a graduate of the 
State Normal School at Albany, New York. In 1852 
Ahira Holmes, a graduate of the Massachusetts State Nor- 
mal School at Bridgewater, and William H. O' Grady from 
Middlebury College, Vermont, were added to the list of 
principals. In 1853 the following additional school prin- 
cipals were elected: Joseph C. Morrill, of the Pembroke 
Military Academy, New Hampshire; Henry P. Carleton, 
of Massachusetts; and myself, from Professor William 
Russell's Merrimack Normal Institute in New Hampshire. 
At this time the salary of principals was fifteen hundred 
dollars a year, — a small compensation, considering the cost 
of living at that time. 

William H. O' Grady succeeded Mr. Nevins as city 
superintendent. There were now seven schools, with a 
total enrollment of fifteen hundred pupils and an average 
attendance of about eight hundred. These early schools 
were all held in rented buildings roughly fitted up for 
school purposes. The school appropriations made by the 
common council were wholly insufficient for the needs of 
a rapidly growing city. Meanwhile there sprang up 
numerous denominational and private schools, — Catholic, 
Episcopal, Presbyterian, German, and French. As might 
have been expected in a city with a cosmopolitan popu- 
lation drawn from every state in the Union and from most 
of the European nations, the common-school spirit was 
relatively weak, and it required heroic work on the part of 
teachers and educators to bring public opinion up to a 
liberal support of the common schools, which were for a 



108 THE MAKING OF A GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

long time regarded by a strong minority of citizens as 
"charity schools" for the education of children whose 
parents were too poor to pay tuition fees in private and 
denominational schools. 

We were all young teachers then, and we took hold of 
our work in earnest, ambitious to play our part in the 
development of a great city. There was no printed course 
of study and we had free play for our individuality. As 
we were not handicapped by written examinations, we 
classified pupils according to their ability or their own 
individual needs. A year or two later some of us had 
classes in natural philosophy, and I had a class of older 
pupils in natural history. 

Mr. Denman and myself worked harmoniously together, 
and there was a generous rivalry between our two schools, 
which were in adjoining districts. We looked after the 
nomination and election of the best citizens we could find 
that were willing to accept the unpaid honor of serving on 
the board of education. At the close of each term we held 
public examinations and exhibitions, and invited parents 
and reporters of the press to attend, thus making known 
the existence of our schools to the general public. The 
congenial work of teaching and the exciting bustle of 
business in a large city formed an agreeable contrast to 
the isolation of a migratory life in the mountains. My 
health had been reestablished and my muscles hardened; 
my eyes had become strong once more, and I made good use 
of them over the rich book treasures of the Mercantile 
Library Association, of which I have now been a mem- 
ber for more than half a century. 

As my school was crowded into a shanty, I began at 
once to stir up the citizens in my district to the need of a 



MY FIRST PUBLIC ADDRESS 109 

larger and better building. The father of one of my 
schoolboys, Mr. Hutton, a public-spirited merchant, made 
a proposition to the board of education, stating that he 
would build on one of his own lots a two-story frame build- 
ing capable of seating three hundred pupils, provided the 
city would lease it for two years at a reasonable rent. His 
offer was accepted and the house was built on Hampton 
Place, near Third Street, between Folsom and Harrison 
streets. On the 2 2d of August, 1854, the new building 
was dedicated in the presence of a large assemblage. The 
exercises were reported in full by the city press. There 
were songs and recitations by the school children, and 
remarks by the mayor-elect, S. P. Webb, Superintendent 
O'Grady, the Reverend John E. Benton, General John 
Wilson, and Alderman Talmadge. Having been invited by 
Superintendent O'Grady to deliver a written address, I took 
advantage of the opportunity to make a strong appeal to 
the people in support of a system of public schools. The 
address was well received by the audience, was compli- 
mented by the press, and published in the Sun, then a 
leading daily paper. As this was my first public address 
in California I quote from the files of the Sun a few para- 
graphs, to show how I then looked at things. 

The opening of a schoolhouse is an occasion which well deserves a public 
commemoration. In ancient times, the heathen temples were dedicated to 
the gods, with games and festivals and the rejoicings of assembled multi- 
tudes; and it is quite as appropriate that the humbler edifices of the common 
school should be consecrated to learning by the songs of children and the 
presence of parents. ItTs natural that teachers, parents, pupils, and citizens 
should all exult together in the dedication of this building. This school- 
house should be consecrated to the spirit of order. Efficient discipline is 
essential to a public school. The children in Sparta all gathered round the 
public table and ate the black broth common to all. In the common school 



IIO THE MAKING OF A GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

of to-day one table is spread for all, with no dainties for pampered pets, and 
no distinctions of rank, or birth, or fortune. 

As teachers we ask the cooperation of fathers and mothers in enforcing strict 
discipline in accordance with the rules of common sense. We would teach 
children that the greatest lesson of life which they have to learn is that of 
self-government, and that if they fail to learn it, we propose to aid them with 
strong school discipline. 

The importance of the common school as a national institution cannot be 
overestimated. The system of free schools, indeed, is an essential element 
of our free government. Our safety lies in the ballot box, and that rests 
directly upon the common schools; for uneducated men have always been 
made and always will be made the tools of political demagogues. The com- 
mon schools have been justly termed "The People's Colleges," for in them 
the great majority of the men and women of this country receive their educa- 
tion. We need the living sympathy of the people in favor of free public 
schools for the education of all classes of children. Of wealth there is enough 
and to spare; strong hands and earnest hearts must use it. This State is 
filling up with inhabitants from the four quarters of the globe. All the ele- 
ments of greatness are here — intellect, talent, genius, energy, — and a rest- 
less activity that knows no precedent. But the heterogeneous atoms lie in 
one chaotic mass, to be molded into symmetry by some controlling power. 

The spirit of the Rincon School is best shown, perhaps, 
by the press reports of its public examinations, exhibi- 
tions, and May festivals. This record begins with an 
examination held in December, 1854, three months after 
the school was installed in the new building. Mayor 
Webb, Superintendent O' Grady, together with Frederick 
Billings and J. B. Moore, members of the board of edu- 
cation, were in attendance, and awarded a prize book to 
Robert Wilson for the best declamation, and a similar 
prize to Margaret Dayley for the best recital of poetry. 

The Sun reported the proceedings as follows : 

An exceedingly interesting exhibition of the pupils of the Rincon School 
was held yesterday afternoon. Mr. Denman was present with his eider 
pupils from the Bush Street School. The salutatory by Master Frank Hut- 



A MAY-DAY FESTIVAL III 

ton was in verse, which was written for the occasion by Mr. Swett, whose 
success as a teacher has been of the most gratifying character. 

At the conclusion of the excerises, as announced on the program, one of the 
young ladies of the school approached Mr. Swett and placed in his hand a 
gold hunting watch and chain, which she begged him to accept as a token of 
* the affection and respect of his pupils. The watch was accompanied by a 
note expressive of this regard, which was signed by some fifty or sixty of the 
scholars of the grammar department. The interest manifested in the public 
schools is of a very encouraging and gratifying character, and always secures 
a large attendance on any of the public exercises. This school numbers 
three hundred pupils, — ■ one hundred in the grammar department, one hun- 
dred in the intermediate, and one hundred in the primary. 

At the end of the next term, April 27, 1855, the Rincon 
School held a public examination and exhibition which was 
fully reported by the press. One report reads as follows: 

An examination of the Rincon School on Hampton Place took place 
before the board of examiners and a large number of spectators yesterday 
afternoon. Specimens of drawing were exhibited, declamations, dialogues, 
singing, and reading by classes, and many other interesting exercises fol- 
lowed. Remarks were made by Mayor Webb, Alderman Moore, Mr. 
Sherman, Mr. O'Grady, and Rev. John E. Benton. 

Following this examination, the school held its first 
May-Day Festival at Russ's Garden, which was situated 
only five blocks distant from the schoolhouse. The owner 
of this pleasure resort, Mr. Russ, had four children in 
the Rincon School, and consequently leased to us the 
large pavilion and playgrounds at a nominal price. The 
program of the day included songs, recitations, declama- 
tions, dialogues, the crowning of a May Queen, dancing, 
and a collection contributed by the parents. The affair 
was in every way a great success. The receipts from the 
sale of admission tickets amounted to four hundred and 
twenty dollars; the expenses, including a fine orchestra, 
were two hundred and sixteen dollars, leaving a balance of 



112 THE MAKING OF A GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

two hundred and four dollars, of which one hundred was 
applied to part payment on a school piano, and one hun- 
dred and four dollars for gymnastic appliances. After- 
wards the pupils raised by subscription for the piano fund 
one hundred and thirty-seven dollars, which, added to the 
one hundred dollars appropriated from the proceeds of the 
exhibition, made two hundred and thirty-seven dollars. 
The piano cost three hundred and fifty dollars, and the 
school was still in debt. 

The Annual Reexamination or Teachers 

At the end of the year, December, 1854, all the teachers 
in the school were reexamined u according to law," for the 
purpose of ascertaining if we knew enough to teach our 
schools for another year. Our examination, wholly oral, 
was similar in all respects to that of the previous year, and 
both were patterned after the primitive examinations 
which I had passed in New Hampshire and Massachu- 
setts. Each of us was asked one question in each of the 
following studies: reading, spelling, arithmetic, grammar, 
and geography. The board of education was made up 
exclusively of men from New England, and they held 
faithfully to old-time precedents. The mayor of San 
Francisco, ex-officio chairman of the board, was from 
Salem, Massachusetts, of which famous Puritan city he 
had once been mayor; Frederick Billings was a prominent 
lawyer from Vermont; William Sherman had been a 
teacher in Rhode Island; J. B. Moore was a young lawyer 
from Concord, Hew Hampshire; and William H. O' Grady, 
the city superintendent, was from Vermont. Mayor 
Webb, true to his Yankee instincts, put the following 
question, which for a quarter of a century had been a kind 



ANNUAL REEXAMINATIONS 113 

of pons asinorum in school examinations in New England : 
" Give an analytical explanation of the reason for invert- 
ing the divisor in division of fractions." This proposition 
was put to Mr. Holmes, whose strong point was mathe- 
matics; and the fun of it all was, that this veteran teacher 
was flustered and after several trials gave it up, saying, 
"I know well enough but can't explain it." The certifi- 
cate which I received has been carefully treasured as a 
relic of the u old regime." It reads as follows: — ■ 

1 

CERTIFICATE 

We, the undersigned, the Committee appointed for the examination of 
Teachers of the Free Common Schools of this City, do certify that we have 
personally examined Mr. J. Swett, and are satisfied that he is of good moral 
character and of sufficient learning and ability, and has a competent aptness 
and fitness for teaching. We therefore grant to him this our Certificate of 
Approval, which shall continue in force one year, unless sooner revoked by 
the Board of Education. 

S. P. Webb, 
Frederick Billings, 
William Sherman, 
Jacob B. Moore, 
Committee. 
San Francisco, November 4, 1854. W. H. O'Grady, Supt. 

These annual reexaminations were continued during 
the nine years that I was principal of the Rincon School. 
The story of how they were finally broken up will be told 
in a future chapter. After 1856, written examinations 
came into vogue. Not only were we reexamined annually, 
but we were also reelected annually, for the term of one 
year only. It was these twin humiliations that eventually 
drove me to seek a more independent field of action. 
But in this connection I cannot refrain from mentioning 
one famous examination held in i860. That was a red- 



114 THE MAKING OF A GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

letter day. The president of the board himself prepared 
most of the questions. He was a man of inordinate self- 
conceit, who once remarked to me that he could teach 
more in one day than any teacher in the city could teach 
in six months. His geography questions, a fair example of 
the others, ran as follows : — 

i. Name all the rivers of the globe. 

2. Name all the bays, gulfs, seas, lakes, and other bodies of water on the 

globe. 

3. Name all the cities of the world. 

4. Name all the countries of the world. 

5. Bound each of the States in the United States. 

We were allowed only one hour for answering these very 
short questions. I recall one tall Texan who had worried 
through the arithmetic examination. When he got hold 
of the geography questions he examined them leisurely, 
and, stalking up to the chairman's table, handed back the 
questions and drawled out: "If the board want me to 
prepare a primary geography, they must pay me for it." 
He took his hat and disappeared. At the end of the hour 
some were still at work on the first question, some on the 
second question, a few on the third, and one on the 
fifth. As for myself, I got through all the questions by 
answers brief and condensed, naming the more important 
rivers, bays, countries, etc., and bounding the United 
States as a whole, — but I gained nothing by generalizing 
my answers. When the report was made, we all stood 
exactly alike, sixty per cent. Twenty years afterwards I 
hunted up these papers from the musty records of the 
board of education as a matter of curiosity, and found out 
how we were credited. 



RELIGION AND POLITICS 115 

Trouble in the Schools 

The first board of education in 185 1 adopted a resolu- 
tion requiring the teachers to open school by reading the 
Bible and by prayer. This rule was drafted by Thomas J. 
Nevins, the city school superintendent, who copied it from 
the school regulations of the city of New York. When 
a new superintendent came into office in 1853, the rule 
was no longer rigidly enforced. Mr. Denman and myself 
thought that under the conditions of a cosmopolitan city, 
in which there were large numbers of the children of 
Catholics and Jews, it was an unwise policy to continue the 
reading of the Bible as a school exercise. But when the 
fusion of parochial schools with the public schools was 
effected in 1854, the question about the reading of the 
Bible in school broke out anew. The organization of the 
Know Nothing party greatly intensified the feeling on 
this point. It was finally settled, many years later, by 
allowing no religious exercises whatever in the city 
schools. 

In November, 1854, school directors and a school 
superintendent were elected by direct vote of the people. 
Previous to this time the school board had been appointed 
by the common council, and the school superintendent 
had been elected by the board of education. The new 
board consisted of eight members, one from each ward, 
with the mayor, C. K. Garrison, ex-officio president. The 
Democratic party ticket was elected by a sweeping majority. 
Mr. E. A. Theller was elected school superintendent. He 
was neither a teacher nor an educator, but he took an 
active part in politics. Among the members of the 
board were Ferdinand C. Ewer from Nantucket, and 



Il6 THE MAKING OF A GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

Elisha Cook, a prominent lawyer. Mr. Ewer, some 
years afterwards, became a popular Episcopal clergyman 
in New York city. 

The board proceeded to reorganize and reform the 

schools by fusing the Catholic parochial schools for boys 

with the existing schools. This was done in consequence 

of an amendment to the state school law of 1853, which 

required the teachers in parochial and convent schools to 

pass an examination and secure a public-school certificate 

as a condition of drawing the public money. The nuns 

and sisters of the various convent schools for girls declined 

to submit to an examination; but the teachers in parochial 

schools for boys passed examinations, were appointed 

teachers, and were paid out of the school fund. For two 

years previous to this action there had been more or less 

discussion by the press as to the policy of apportioning 

public money to the support of sectarian schools. Through 

the columns of the Pacific and of the daily papers I had 

taken a hand in opposition to this division of the school 

fund. As a matter of course, when the consolidation of 

parochial schools and public schools went into effect, I 

was marked for decapitation. My official head was saved 

only by the determined stand in my favor taken by 

Ferdinand C. Ewer, a stanch Democrat, who held an 

office in the Custom House, and also edited the Pioneer 

Magazine, to which I was a contributor. I knew nothing 

of all this until several years afterwards, when Mr. Ewer 

gave me the inside history of the movement against me. 

Several other teachers, however, were "dropped out" to 

make room for teachers from the parochial schools. 



BUSINESS DEPRESSION 1 17 

Business Depression and the Vigilance Committee 

In 1853 there had been a business boom, and specula- 
tion ran riot. But in 1854 there were heavy business 
failures, and in 1855 a great financial collapse began. 
There were one hundred and twenty-seven failures, amount- 
ing in all to eight millions of dollars. Two great banks, 
Adams & Company, and Page, Bacon & Company, sus- 
pended payment and became hopelessly insolvent, spread- 
ing ruin among thousands of depositors. Many other 
smaller banking institutions were involved in the general 
crash. 

The business failures were intensified, and perhaps 
were partly caused by the corruption of the city govern- 
ment, which is thus graphically described by Theodore H. 
Hittell in his History of California: 

The political and social corruptionists of San Francisco included not only 
the usual criminal classes in general, but also regular experts in ballot-box 
stuffing, and, worst of all, those kinds of politicians who employed, abetted, 
and, by their recognition, gave encouragement and a sort of character to 
manipulators of fraudulent elections. Bodies of men frequently marched 
from precinct to precinct on election day, repeating their votes and swearing 
them in by perjured testimony. 

But what may be called the very perfection of election fraud and rascality 
was reached in the invention and at length frequent use of what were called 
"double improved back-action ballot boxes," which were so constructed 
with false sides that any number of tickets could be hidden in them in 
advance, exposed at the proper time, and counted so as to made majorities 
exactly as might be desired. 

The facts thus accurately set forth were known to all 
citizens of San Francisco who took. any interest in politi- 
cal affairs. There was no hope of redress except by force, 
because the whole election machinery was in the hands of 
the roughs and their abettors. It was under such con- 






Il8 THE MAKING OF A GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

ditions that James King of William started a daily paper, 
the Evening Bulletin (October, 1855), which boldly ex- 
pressed the feelings of the indignant and despairing better 
class of citizens. Personally fearless and independent, he 
dared to tell the truth. A month after the first issue of 
this paper, William H Richardson, United States marshal 
of California, was assassinated on the street by a gambler 
named Charles Cora. The assassin was tried but not 
convicted, four jurymen voting for acquittal, one for 
manslaughter, and seven for murder. From 1849 U P to 
this time — seven years — there had been in San Francisco 
over a thousand homicides and only one legal execution. 
Mr. King continued his reform editorials until he was 
shot down on the street by James P. Casey, a supervisor 
from the eighth ward of the city, — a ward notorious for 
its ballot-box stuffing and for fraudulent election returns. 
Casey was arrested and confined in the county jail. The 
intense popular excitement led to the immediate forma- 
tion of what is known in history as the Vigilance Com- 
mittee, — an organization of citizens formed for the 
purpose of enforcing law and justice. The leader of the 
movement was William T. Coleman, from Kentucky, one 
of the leading business men of the city. Fifteen hundred 
citizens were soon enrolled and organized into companies 
of one hundred men each, who elected their own officers. 
This number was soon increased to twenty-five hundred 
men. On the last night of the enrollment I stood in line 
until midnight, when the enrollment closed, because no 
more volunteers were wanted. There were a hundred men 
in line ahead of me, and thus I failed to become a member 
of the Vigilance Committee. An executive committee was 
elected and a thorough organization was soon completed. 



WORK OF THE VIGILANCE COMMITTEE 119 

Cora and Casey were taken from the county jail by an 
armed force, conducted to the rooms of the Vigilance 
Committee, tried in due form, 'and convicted of murder. 
James King of William lingered six days after he was 
shot before he expired. On the day of the funeral, Cora 
and Casey were hanged in front of the rooms of the Vigi- 
lance Committee. At a later date two other murderers 
were executed A score of roughs were tried and banished 
from the state. After four months of active work the 
committee was disbanded. 

Educational Activity Outside of School 

During the exciting years from 1854 to 1856 it is not to 
be supposed that I did nothing but drill school children 
in reading, writing, and arithmetic. I contributed to the 
press occasional articles on school topics that were under 
discussion. Turning to my voluminous scrapbook, I find 
many of these articles clipped from the newspapers. The 
Pacific at that time was a well-conducted, influential 
weekly paper of large circulation, both in the city and in 
the mines. It was the official organ of the Congregational 
churches, but it was liberally edited with marked literary 
ability and was open for the discussion of educational 
matters. The headings of some of my articles in the 
Pacific run as follows : — 

Examination of Public Schools; Against the Separation of the Sexes in 
Public Schools (three articles of two columns each) ; On Juvenile Deprav- 
ity in San Francisco; Against the Apportionment of School Moneys to De- 
nominational Schools; etc. 

By a rule of the board of education all teachers were 
required to attend a normal school held on Saturday 
forenoon of each week from nine to twelve o'clock. I 



120 THE MAKING OF A GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

find in the old files of the Pacific an address which I read 
before one of these meetings, from which I quote a few 
paragraphs to show the professional spirit of half a century 
ago: 

The question addressed to the teacher is, not how much do you know of 
books, but what do you know of men and things; not can you scan Virgil, but 
can you write strong English; not can you make eloquent speeches, but can 
you talk common sense. A living man is asked for, not a walking library. 
The isolated teacher cannot become a skillful one. As well expect a solitary 
man on a lonely island to attain high civilization. A child cannot be well 
educated at home; he needs to enter a class and gain healthful vigor by buf- 
feting with playmates and equals. 

Association in some form is the soul of modern progress. We constitute 
the advance guard on the shores of the Pacific, cut off from the main body 
of American teachers. Let us organize and work together. Let us make 
our influence felt in leading public opinion in school affairs. The press is 
open to us; let us use it. All we need is common sense and uncommon energy. 
Let us meet together as seekers after truth. That our meetings may be the 
means of advancing each of us in the scholarship of teaching, that they may 
make us more skillful, more earnest, more liberal, is my desire, and, I doubt 
not, yours. It is only the little-minded that despise little things. Remem- 
ber with Plato, "Men cannot propose a higher or holier object for study 
than education and all that appertains to education." 

At a state teachers' convention, called by the state 
superintendent of schools, December 26-28, in San Fran- 
cisco, besides taking an active part in discussions I read 
a paper on " Reading and Elocution as a Means of Cul- 
ture in School," which was published in full in the Pacific. 
At a following convention I read a paper on the "Love of 
the Beautiful," which was published in full in the Pioneer 
Magazine. I sent occasional letters to the Boston Culti- 
vator concerning affairs in San Francisco, and an occasional 
contribution to the Knickerbocker Magazine, which was 
then in its decadence. Meanwhile, I was a busy reader 
of books on science, history, and literature, drawn from 
the Mercantile Library. 



THE RINCON SCHOOL 121 

The Rincon School Grows Larger 

Early in 1856 the Rincon School was so overcrowded 
that the building was enlarged by the addition of a wing 
which gave us five additional classrooms, and, strange to 
say, a large office for the principal and the teachers. 
This office room I carpeted and furnished at my own 
personal expense, amounting to four hundred and fifty 
dollars, and it became a reception room for parents 
and visitors. From the proceeds of a May festival the 
school yard was fitted up with the beginning of a gym- 
nasium, and I myself led the gymnastic class of boys half 
an hour daily during the noon intermission, and sometimes 
in the morning before nine o'clock, or at the forenoon 
recess. The girls were drilled daily in the schoolroom in 
free gymnastics and in the use of wands. In the spring- 
time I often took the pupils out for walks on the hills of 
the Potrero, which were then a garden of wild flowers. I 
encouraged the boys to play ball, and on Saturdays in- 
vited them to go with me on long tramps over the sand 
hills to the beach and the " heads," often walking from ten 
to fifteen miles during the day. The boys took along for 
lunch a supply of bread and also raw beefsteaks, which we 
broiled on long sticks over a camp fire. Excursions of 
this kind the boys never have forgotten. As I meet some 
of them, forty years later, they always give my hand a 
hearty grip and exclaim: "I'm glad to see you. Say, didn't 
we have jolly good times together when you took us out 
over the sand hills ? " 

The good will of the larger boys I gained by becoming 
their leader in athletics and excursions, and they aided me 
in securing firm discipline in school hours. I took the 



122 THE MAKING OF A GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

older pupils on visits to foundries, machine shops, and 
flour mills. The school was under strict discipline, but 
I seldom resorted to corporal punishment, and then only 
in cases of the most flagrant insubordination. The cor- 
poral-punishment roll did not exceed half a dozen cases a 
year. The military drill in marching into and out of 
school, keeping step to music of the piano, and the habit 
of obedience in gymnastic drill, naturally led to good order 
in the schoolroom. Once a week, at least, I had a plain 
talk with the pupils on honor, truthfulness, courage, and 
other virtues, ending by reading some short story or anec- 
dote illustrating some one of these topics. Politeness also 
received due consideration. In this way there grew up 
in the school in time an unwritten code of manners and 
morals. 

At the annual city election in 1855, the Know Nothing 
party elected a part of its ticket and brought into the 
board of education several able members, among whom 
was William Sherman, a man of marked executive ability. 
He was elected president of the board in 1856, when he 
began his work by taking the preliminary steps towards 
securing a city high school, which was established, after 
much opposition, in 1856, under the name Union Grammar 
School, though it had a high-school course of study. In 
the month of April he personally conducted an oral ex- 
amination of the highest grade class in each of the city 
schools. His examination of my school lasted all day and 
was thoroughgoing. He was accompanied by James 
King of William, editor and manager of the Evening 
Bulletin, the recently established reform paper. Mr. King 
was a close observer and I will let his editorial report tell 
the story: 



AN ELOCUTIONARY EXHIBITION 123 

Of the examination yesterday, we must say it far exceeded our expecta- 
tions and was perfectly satisfactory as to the fidelity of the teachers and the 
proficiency of the scholars. The exercises in reading elicited unbounded 
admiration from all present. The girls all read well, but to our surprise the 
boys at this school excelled in this department of the exercises. It was a 
pleasure to listen to them. The examination of the philosophy class was the 
closest and the severest ordeal of the kind we have ever witnessed. The 
examination, made by Mr. Sherman of the board of education, was of the 
most searching kind, and the answers of the pupils evidenced a thorough 
acquaintance with the principles of the science which they had been study- 
ing. The questions were not alone such as might be found in the books, but 
were of every imaginable kind. In a variety of examples where the laws of 
nature were supposed to be suspended, the answers to the questions put 
evinced no little thought and reasoning on the part of the pupils. The an- 
swers in several cases elicited the hearty applause of the audience. 

The official public examination conducted by President 
Sherman was followed by an elocutionary exhibition held 
in the assembly room of the schoolhouse, especially intended 
for the fathers and mothers that wished to see their chil- 
dren act their parts in reading and speaking. The program 
which is pasted in my scrapbook runs up to No. 30 in 
the list of readings, recitations, declamations, and dialogues. 
It took much patient drill to make forty boys and girls fit 
a to speak in public on the stage." This training I did 
myself, all except the preparing of the May Queen, to 
which my assistant teachers attended. The selection of 
suitable pieces was no small task, but this special training 
was never allowed to interfere with the regular work of 
teaching. It was all done before or after school hours, or 
at recess or intermissions. In nearly every such exhibi- 
tion I wrote two or three original pieces — prose or verse 
— fitting the occasion. But if the work was hard, the 
reward was great. I came to know my pupils, and they 
in turn became attached to me. 



124 THE MAKING OF A GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

May-Day Festival 

On May 2, 1856, the Rincon School closed the term 
with a May festival at Russ's Garden, held for the purpose 
of raising money to buy additional calisthenic and gym- 
nastic appliances. In addition to songs, readings, declama- 
tions, and dialogues, the boys, led by their principal, gave 
a gymnastic exhibition on the garden ground, which in- 
cluded exercises on the horizontal bar, on the rings, and 
with clubs, wands, and dumbbells. The opening number 
was a piece of "verse" written for the occasion by the 
principal, and recited by the May Queen. 

THE MAY QUEEN'S WELCOME 

Friends, parents, and children, merry welcome to all ! 
My rule is supreme in this beautiful hall; 
The happiest queen that reigns under the sun, 
I command you to join in the frolic and fun! 

Dear subjects, from lessons I set you all free, 
Neither schoolma'am nor master dare contradict me; 
And puzzling committeemen, sober and glum, 
Within my dominions will never dare come. 

Poor students, with weary and woebegone looks, 
Whose hearts are as dry as a bundle of books; 
Escape from confinement, grow merry and gay, 
And come to the free school of laughing Miss May. 

Brave boys, from the schoolroom I turn you all out 
To grass, like young calves, to cut capers about; 
Sweet girls, you may romp till each ruddy cheek glows 
With a color that vies with the red of the rose. 

My books are green fields and lovely wild flowers, 
My playgrounds, the hillsides; my schoolroom, the bowers; 
The birds, my musicians; my harps, the green trees; 
My scholars may laugh and play just as they please. 



THE MAY QUEEN'S WELCOME 1 25 

Dear "old folks!" just think of your merry May-days, 
When you, handsome boys, met the girls in their plays; 
When plump little maidens, with coquettish arts 
And sweetest of glances, tormented your hearts! 

Dear fathers and mothers, were not you once young ? 
The sweet songs of youth, were they not by you sung ? 
Hearts still are the same as in good days of old, 
The same pleasant story forever is told! 

The girls meet you here with the sweetest of glances, 
The toes of the boys ache to join in the dances; 
And, mothers, if you do not join with us, too, 
I'll tell the old tale of our fathers and you! 

So, young folks and old folks, join all in the fun, 
The dancers are waiting, the talking is done; 
We'll meet you again on some future May-day 
When we need a dollar which you have to pay. 

James King of William, editor of the Bulletin, himself 
wrote about the exercises as follows, in part: 

It was nearly twelve o'clock when we arrived at the large pavilion, before 
reaching which we could distinctly hear the voice of one of the boys who 
was speaking. The declamation was very good indeed. To hear Frank 
Soule's poem on "The Press" recited as it was by Master William Gillis was 
well worth a trip to the Garden. Several performances not on the program 
were introduced with pleasing effect, and among the rest were declamations 
from scholars from the Nonantum and North Beach schools. After the 
exhibition was through, a recess was had to allow the children to refresh 
themselves with a cold lunch, and here occurred another item worth men- 
tioning. In announcing the fact, Mr. Swett added that "after the children 
were served, there would be room and plenty to eat for the grown people." 
This announcement of reversing the usual order of things was received by the 
"grown-up" ones with unbounded satisfaction, the impression being that 
as this was a children's festival the children should be served first, and this 
spirit was kept up throughout. It was announced that the dances would 
at first be confined to the children of Mr. Swett's school, then those of the 
other schools present would be invited to join, after which the older persons 



126 THE MAKING OF A GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

generally would be invited to join in. The May Queen and her attendants 
led off, and in succession as more room was made, others joined in, until 
finally the large floor was crowded with young and old, and all enjoyed them- 
selves to their hearts' content. The scene presented to the view, as the many 
little ones were whirling in graceful measures, was enough to convert the 
strictest Presbyterian that ever lived. We left at about half-past five, and 
even at that hour a large number were keeping up the festivity. From all 
the teachers, and from as many of the scholars as we could speak to, we 
received a hearty welcome, which we shall never forget. 

What little doubt we ever had of the propriety of boys and girls going to 
the same school was all dispelled. We go in for it with all our hearts. At 
Mr. Swett's school the other day, we were pleased to notice a little act of gal- 
lantry on the part of one of the boys. The reading class was standing near 
a window curtain which kept waving back and forth over the book of a school- 
girl, when the nearest boy stepped forth and fastened back the curtain. The 
act was done without ostentation. It was a simple act, possibly a trifle, but 
that boy acted the gentleman, and the influence of that sweet girl already 
had its effect in that room. What wonder that the girl's "report" stood 
so high, or that the boy's answers to the questions put to him evinced 
such close application to his studies! Let the boys and girls go to the same 
school, we say. Place them in the same room and the same classes. 

These were the last editorial comments on schools ever 
written by Mr. King. Eleven days later, on May 13, 
1856, he fell on the street, a short distance from his office, 
mortally wounded by a pistol shot from the hand of an 
assassin. 



School Examinations 

In August, 1856, at the close of the quarterly term, the 
Rincon School held the usual public examination. The 
Alta California reported as follows, in part: 

As is his usual custom; Mr. Swett held a sort of review or examination 
of the classes in arithmetic, grammar, and geography, followed by reading 
and declamation exercises. There has been added to the school grounds, 
through the efforts of Mr. Swett, an excellent gymnasium, in which the larger 



ANOTHER ELOCUTIONARY EXHIBITION 127 

boys are exercised daily by the teacher, who appears to be as familiar with 
gymnastics as he is with the regular school studies. 

When we arrived at the school yesterday, it was the hour of the midday 
intermission, and we found about fifty boys in the yard going through with 
their various exercises of the gymnasium, while in the schoolroom the girls 
were engaged jn dancing up and down the aisles and in front of the desk. 
The improvements which have been added to Mr. Swett's school cannot be 
too highly spoken of or too highly commended. They are what should be 
supplied to every school in the city. 

In October, 1856, the Rincon School, being in want of 
more money for gymnastic appliances, gave an elocution- 
ary exhibition in Musical Hall, then the largest in the 
city. The readers and speakers included the older pupils 
that had been under training for two years, and the selec- 
tions for reading were of marked literary merit. I shall let 
the report of one of the morning papers give an account 
of the exercises. 

The room was densely crowded, every seat was occupied, and numbers 
were compelled to go away. The pupils occupied raised seats on the back 
of the stage, which was tastefully decorated. The program arranged by Mr. 
Swett was excellent, and the rendering of the various pieces reflected the high- 
est credit both on the scholars and their teacher. It is proverbial, however, 
that Mr. Swett is one of the most successful schoolmasters in the city, so no 
one was surprised at the excellence of the entertainment. We have no space 
for particular notices of those who took part. After the exercises were over, 
the pupils, teacher, and audience adjourned to Assembly Hall near and en- 
joyed themselves in the graceful mazes of the dance until the small hours of 
the morning. 

Financially, the exhibition was a success. The receipts 
from the sale of tickets amounted to five hundred and 
seventy- three dollars; the expenses for halls, music, and 
printing were one hundred and ninety dollars, leaving a 
balance of three hundred and eighty-three dollars for 
school purposes. This sum paid up in full the debt on 



128 THE MAKING OF A GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

the school piano — one hundred twelve dollars and seventy- 
five cents; the debt on school incidentals and the gymna- 
sium, one hundred twenty-one dollars and seventy-five 
cents, leaving a balance to the credit of the school of one 
hundred forty-nine dollars and fifty cents. 

Leave of Absence 

It must not be supposed for an instant that my time 
was mainly devoted to public examinations and exhibi- 
tions. The school now numbered five hundred pupils, and 
every room was crowded. The whole work of super- 
vision fell upon me, and in addition to this I had the 
entire instruction of the highest class. The regular rou- 
tine work in the ordinary school studies went on with the 
regularity of clockwork. The public examinations and 
exhibitions were the means used to bring the parents into 
sympathy with the work their children were doing and to 
make known through the press the existence of public 
schools. I had struggled first to gain a foothold, and 
then by strenuous effort to win recognition as a teacher. 
I felt that I needed a rest, and my mother was entreating 
me to make her a visit. Besides, I had a strong desire to 
visit the best Eastern city schools and learn something 
more about teaching and school management. I applied 
to the board for a four months' leave of absence, and my 
request was granted. Hearing of this, my pupils gave me 
a surprise by placing in my hands the following letter: 

San Francisco, April 18, 1857. 
Mr. John Swett, . 

Dear Sir: — Having learned of your intention to visit the Atlantic states, 
we desire to express our regard and esteem for you as a teacher, and we respect- 



MY TRIP TO THE EAST 1 29 

fully tender to you a complimentary party to be given to you at the close of 
the present term, at such place as you may be pleased to name. 
With feelings of sincere esteem we remain, 

Your Scholars and Friends, 

(Signed) Lizzie Thornton, 
Lucy Atwood, F. B. Lyle, A. F. Lyle, Mary Shafter, Annie Hucks, William 
Gillis, Frederick Russ, Henery B. Russ, Clara Cummings, Anna Chalmers, 
Mary J. Little, Emeline Anderson, Minnie Elliot, and seventy-eight other 
pupils. 

Of course I named Russ's Garden as the place, and we 
set about arranging a program which included a few 
recitations, songs, declamations, the crowning of a May 
Queen, and a good social time. The large pavilion was 
crowded with parents, pupils, and friends, and the occa- 
sion was one to be long remembered. The receipts from 
the sale of tickets amounted to five hundred and forty- 
four dollars; the expenses for pavilion, music, printing, and 
incidentals were one hundred and fifty-four dollars, leav- 
ing a balance of three hundred and twenty dollars, which 
was turned over to me by the finance committee of pupils. 

My Trip to the East 

I took passage in the steamship Golden Gate for New 
York by way of Panama, paying two hundred and fifty 
dollars for a through ticket. The steamer was crowded 
with more than a thousand passengers. I had the lowest 
of three berths in a small inside stateroom. The fourth 
night out I retired early; the two men occupying the 
higher berths came in late, closing both the door and the 
window. About midnight I woke with difficulty from a 
deathly stupor of suffocation. I am satisfied that if I had 
not made a mighty effort to rouse myself I should have 
been reported in the morning as "dead from apoplexy." 



130 THE MAKING OF A GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

That night of bad air in a coffin-like stateroom laid the 
foundation of a throat trouble that lasted for several 
years. During the remainder of the voyage I slept on 
the cabin floor under the table. 

On my arrival in New York I visited several large public 
schools and was received most courteously by the teachers. 
In Boston I stepped into a large grammar school for girls 
and presented a letter of introduction from the presi- 
dent of the board of education of San Francisco. The 
principal, who was hearing a recitation in history glanced 
at my letter, waved me to a chair, and went on with his 
class. He was evidently in ill humor, for he badgered 
the girls mercilessly, and at the end of the hour told them 
to take the same lesson for the next day, threatening them 
with detention after school if the lesson were not thoroughly 
learned. Then he took his hat, remarking as he passed 
me that he was going to his lunch, and without another 
word he stalked off, leaving me sitting on the platform. 
It is hardly necessary to say that I made no further visits 
to the Boston schools. 

I visited Professor William Russell at Andover, Massa- 
chusetts, and found him giving a drill in elocution to a 
large class of theological students. I presented to him a 
small' gold nugget, about the size of a robin's egg, the last 
remnant of a few specimens that I had dug out of a drift 
in the Morris Ravine. After this meeting I never saw 
him again, but I received from him many kind letters of 
counsel and encouragement. 

In Providence I passed two delightful days in the Rhode 
Island State Normal School, then in charge of Dana P. 
Colburn, whom I had met when he was a teacher of meth- 
ods in arithmetic in William Russell's Merrimack Normal 



WELCOME HOME 13 1 

Institute in New Hampshire. I recall vividly Mr. Col- 
burn's drill of his class in geometry, which seemed to me 
the perfection of the art of teaching. I had the good for- 
tune also to hear Professor S. S. Greene, author of Greene's 
Grammar, give a lesson in language that I still recall with 
delight. 

My mother welcomed me home with joy, but her grief 
was great when I was forced to let her know that I had 
returned only to make her a visit, and that my life work 
lay in California. In my native village I found myself a 
stranger. I visited the brick schoolhouse and the old 
academy, but went away saddened to find that all the 
boys who went to school with me had moved away to 
Boston, or had gone out West, or to Texas, or to Califor- 
nia. I bade my mother a tearful good-by, went to New 
York and secured a steamship ticket for San Francisco 
via Panama, for which I paid two hundred and seventy- 
five dollars. The steamer was overcrowded, and some of 
the passengers were attacked with a type of ship fever 
before we reached San Francisco. Two strong men, 
friends of mine, died a few weeks after their return. I 
escaped with my life, though I had a severe attack of 
fever and a bad hemorrhage of the throat. But hard 
training in the gymnasium, combined with a rigid hygienic 
diet, finally restored me to health. 

On my return in August, both teachers and pupils gave 
me a warm welcome, and I was glad to take up my con- 
genial work once more. The board of education this 
year published a printed course of study, with the usual 
rules and regulations, taken from eastern reports. The 
schools were now classified as primary, grammar, and 
high schools. Previous to this time they had been known 



132 THE MAKING OF A GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

as primary, intermediate, and grammar departments, 
after the manner of the New York city schools. John C. 
Pelton became city superintendent, and William Sherman, 
president of the board of education. Written examina- 
tions were required for admission to the high school. 

At the end of the term, in 1858, the school closed for the 
summer vacation with an examination and a May party 
which netted two hundred and twenty-nine dollars. 

While my work in teaching was pleasant, the position of 
a public school-teacher at this time was no bed of roses. 
Overbearing and conceited men often made their way into 
the board of education and played the part of petty 
tyrants over school-teachers. The places of all teachers in 
the school department were declared vacant at the end of 
each year, and in secret session the board of education 
elected new teachers or reelected the old ones. Some 
school directors had friends for whom places had to be 
provided, even if competent teachers were left out of the 
list. Then at the end of the year we were required to 
pass a long and tedious written examination in order to 
determine our fitness "to teach a common school one 
year." Meanwhile, I pursued a steady course of reading 
and study to make up in some measure for lack of a col- 
lege training. I did more than my share of preparing 
papers for educational meetings and in contributing to the 
press on educational matters. 

Superintendent of the Unitarian Sunday School 

In i860, at the urgent request of Thomas Starr King, I 
accepted an appointment as superintendent of the Sunday 
school connected with the First Unitarian Society, in which 
I had been engaged for a year as teacher of a small class. 



THE NEW RINCON SCHOOLHOUSE 133 

I did not desire this appointment, but I felt willing to 
make any personal sacrifice to be of service to the talented 
preacher and lecturer who was pastor of the society of 
which I was a member. This Sunday school was a very 
large one, and was provided with a well-selected library. 
Horace Davis, afterwards Congressman, and president of 
the University of California, was the librarian at the time 
I was superintendent. Starr King was deeply interested 
in the public-school system of California, and I found in 
him a warm friend and wise adviser. In i860 he de- 
livered an address at the dedication of the new high-school 
building, in the course of which he spoke as follows, in 
part: 

The spiritual forces must be started soon in States like this, and trained to 
ten times their present vigor, or we shall be unable to wield the majestic armor 
and implements of our science and materialistic culture. Every time I enter 
a school building I travel back to the time twenty years ago (when I was a 
young man), when my name was enrolled in the army of instructors. During 
the three years of service appointed to me in that department, I learned so 
much of the difficulties and responsibilities of the office, that the stepping 
into a pulpit seemed like passing into an easier sphere of duty. We do not 
pay our social reverence wisely as yet, even in our most advanced and thought- 
ful communities. 

Dedication of the Rincon Schoolhouse 

The Rincon School had outgrown the rented building on 
Hampton Place, and in i860 the board of education pur- 
chased a lot on Vassar Place, three blocks distant, and 
proceeded to build a schoolhouse, neither larger nor better 
than the old one. It was a very plain two-story house 
with four classrooms on each floor, each room seating from 
forty to fifty pupils. On the upper floor the rooms were 
divided by large sliding doors, so that the four rooms 
could be thrown together on public occasions. The doors 



134 THE MAKING OF A GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

were partly made up of glass windowpanes, so that the 
principal could keep his eye on the assistant teachers. 
Some years later I saw in the city of Philadelphia several 
antique schoolhouses on a similar plan, which had been 
erected when the Lancastrian system was in vogue. 
This poorly planned, cheap building was dedicated as 
if it had been a palace. On December 22, Forefathers' 
Day, the exercises were made memorable by an address 
by Thomas Starr King. On the morning of that day I 
received from Mr. King the following characteristic note: 

December 22, i860. 
My dear Friend: — My sermon is not finished, but I will not disappoint 
you. 

My wife will ride nearly to the schoolhouse with me, if the carriage will 
accommodate. I am sorry that I cannot stay all the evening. 

Yours sincerely, 
T. S. King. 

Dr. Tuthill, the brilliant literary editor of the Bulletin, 
reported the proceedings, part of which I quote : 

FOREFATHERS' DAY 
The Rincon School Housewarming 

Those who attended the Vassar Place School housewarming on Saturday 
night, will remember it for years to come — if not for what they saw, 
heard, or did there, then for the drenching they experienced getting to or 
from it. 

The afternoon had been pleasant enough ; the haze that early in the even- 
ing eclipsed the stars and moon was presumed to be only,a fog, until sud- 
denly, about eight o'clock, the wind rose, and the rain came dashing down in 
full-grown drops. Far the larger portion of the Rincon scholars were already 
gathered to their festival, dressed in their Christmas rig; and but for the irre- 
pressible gayety of people of their age, the first rattle of rain on the window — 
it came so violently yet steadily, not with the impertinent air of a shower that 
knows it must dry up in an hour, but with the steady blows of a storm that is 



forefathers' day 135 

in for a whole night's frolic — would have started in every breast the ques- 
tion: "How shall we ever get home without drowning?" 

The house was brilliantly illuminated, and all its rooms were thrown open. 
In the upper floor — the glass doors thrown back — as many as could com- 
fortably squeeze into the seats were gathered for some exercises that should 
be commemorative both of Forefathers' Day and of the inauguration of a 
public Schoolhouse. 

The Reverend Mr. Willey was first called — one of the earliest friends 
of the school. He spoke very briefly, but right to the point — the use of 
the school to a Christian people, the attention due from a Christian people 
to the school, the equal demand of the Pilgrim Fathers for schoolhouse 
and meetinghouse, the joint influence of the two in making our country 
what it is. 

Then the Reverend Mr. King was introduced. Obedient to the rule of the 
occasion, "Be short," he too spoke briefly. With a few bold strokes he 
etched the picture of the Mayflower landing her famous passengers two hun- 
dred and forty years ago, on a day such as this evening represented, as well 
as weather could in California, the December weather of New England. Then 
for a moment glorifying this particular edifice, he traced back its history, 
and showed that its foundation stones came out of the Mayflower's hold; 
following down its genealogical tree, and found its roots twining around and 
burrowing under Plymouth Rock. Gathering up the lessons of the day and 
of the history of the principles that were planted in Massachusetts soil, he 
held them up a moment, that the old and young, the overcoated and muf- 
fled, and the gayly dressed little folk might see them — and then Mr. 
King retired. 

The principal, Mr. Swett, followed. The thought that he enforced was 
this, that public education is the safeguard of the Union. In conclusion he 
recited the following original verses: 

NEW ENGLAND MEMORIES 

I 

Let us talk together, brothers, of the good old Christmas times, 
When sleigh bells on our northern hills rang out their merry chimes; 
That northern land — our native land — is shrouded now in snow, 
But round its blazing firesides warm hearts are in a glow; 
No biting frosts, no cutting winds, no wintry snows can chill 
The hearts that loved us long ago, the hearts that love us still; 
As the year brings back Thanksgiving and Pilgrim Fathers' day, 
Our hearts are turning homeward to Massachusetts Bay. 



136 THE MAKING OF A GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

II 

God bless the rough old granite land, and Plymouth's sea- washed rock s 

And guard all wandering children of the hardy Pilgrim stock. 

New England's wealth lies treasured, not in golden stream nor glen, 
But in priceless souls of women and heroic hearts of men. 

Our footsteps wander from her, but our pride is still to know, 

We keep the steady habits that she gave us long ago; 

The ties that bind us to that land, nor time nor space can sever, 
Our homes are on Pacific's strand, our hearts are hers forever. 

Ill] 

Across the Rocky Mountains, from Massachusetts Bay, 
From Bunker Hill, from Plymouth Rock, there comes a voice to-day, 
Calling Puritans and Pilgrims in every distant State, 
To rally for the safety of the Union, strong and great. 
We send our solemn pledges forever to abide 
By the principles of freedom for which our fathers died; 
That granite shaft of Bunker Hill shall crumble into dust 
Ere the sons of Pilgrim Fathers are recreant to their trust. 

With this — and here in a lump we will report the applauses which fre- 
quently interrupted each of the speakers, Mr. Willey, Mr. King, and Mr. 
Swett — the speaking closed. It had altogether scarcely occupied more 
than half an hour, and then recommenced the festivities. The ankles and 
feet were eloquent henceforth, and all the poetry that followed was the 
" Poetry of motion. " The house was then more crowded on account of the 
storm, since most of those who were there as late as nine o'clock determined 
to make a night of it. 

At eleven o'clock, the heavenly bottles being corked up for a while, and 
nothing but the mud remaining to make the going terrible, the exercises of 
the evening were suddenly brought to a conclusion, and the crowd dispersed. 
Probably not one of the hundred who were there will forget for years that 
Forefathers' Day comes just before Christmas, in the very center of the rainy 
season, just after the very shortest day of winter, and that churches, school- 
houses, freedon of thought and of speech, are elements as essential to the 
picture of the settlers of New England as its colors are to a description of the 
rainbow. 

Near the close of the year I was taken down with a 
sudden attack of typhoid fever, during which I suffered a 
relapse which left me for a week evenly balanced between 



MY MARRIAGE 137 

life and death; but wise medical treatment by Dr. Warren, 
together with careful nursing, turned the scales in favor of 
life. In overhauling my papers to refresh my memory of 
events, I came across the following note, written during 
my sickness, while I was hardly able to hold a pen : 

My Dear Pupils: — December 13, 1861. 

I have been thinking all day of school, and the tears have gushed into my 
eyes many times to think that I cannot be with you to-day. 

Since I last met you, I have suffered severely; and during the long, painful 
watches of the weary nights, I have often thought of the cheerful, familiar, 
pleasant faces which greeted me at school. I do not know that I shall ever 
meet you again as teacher, and so feel still sadder that I cannot meet you 
to-day face to face. God bless each and every one of you. I hardly knew 
how much I had become attached to you all. 

I cannot write any more. Good-by. Your principal, 

John Swett. 

The annual examination of teachers was held while I 
was delirious with typhoid fever, but the board of educa- 
tion granted me a reprieve for three months, though an 
attempt was made to declare my position vacant and 
elect another teacher in my place. Of this attempt, made 
in secret session of the board, I knew nothing until told of 
it a year later. After my recovery, I passed a rigid exam- 
ination and was declared "fit to teach a common school 
for one year," unless the certificate "was sooner revoked by 
the board of education." This severe experience fixed in 
my mind a firm determination to get out of school-teach- 
ing as soon as I could see any other way of earning a 
living. 

My Marriage 

To me the most important event of the year was my 
marriage, May 8, 1862, to Mary Louise Tracy, in the 
Methodist Church on Powell Street, San Francisco, by the 



138 THE MAKING OF A GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

Reverend M. C. Briggs, pastor of the church of which she 
was a member. My wife was the daughter of Judge 
Frederick Palmer Tracy, 1 a prominent lawyer and political 
leader in San Francisco. 

1 Frederick P. Tracy, born at Windham, Connecticut, in 1815, was edu- 
cated in the common schools, and bred to work in his father's machine shop. 
At seventeen yearsof age he joined the Methodist Church and soon felt called 
to become a lay preacher. In 1837 he was ordained an elder and was stationed 
at Newbury, Mass., and later at Lynn. In 1840 he established a newspaper 
called The People's Advocate. In 1844 he was pastor of a church at Wil- 
liamsburg, Mass., where two years later his health broke down. One of his 
parishioners advanced him the means to take a trip to Europe, in 1846-47. 

At the end of two years he returned, and edited for a time The Cayuga 
New Era, in the state of New York. In 1849 ne joined the Argonauts and 
settled in San Francisco, where he was elected Inez de Paz, an office resem- 
bling that of Justice of the Peace, but with more extended duties. In 185 1 
he engaged in the practice of law and became city and county attorney. In 
1854 he made a visit to Connecticut and brought back with him his family, 
consisting of his wife and four children, — Mary Louise, William Frederick, 
Grace Amelia, and Thomas Gamier. 

Judge Tracy in early life had been a consistent opponent of the extension 
of slavery, and he took an active part in organization of the Republican 
party in California during the Fremont campaign, when he was candidate for 
elector on the Republican presidential ticket in 1856. As an effective politi- 
cal speaker, he had few equals and no superiors in the Republican party in 
California. He was a delegate to the Republican National Convention that 
nominated Abraham Lincoln in i860. He was appointed on the committee 
on resolutions, and was selected to make the rough draft of the party plat- 
form for that campaign. While engaged in stumping the state of New 
York, worn out by exposure and fatigue, he died suddenly during the cam- 
paign, from the effect of a severe cold. His body was brought back to 
California for burial in Lone Mountain Cemetery, and his resting place 
is marked by a granite shaft erected by the contributions of his numerous 
personal and political friends. 

When Judge Tracy was making the tour of Europe he became interested 
in tracing up the pedigree of the Tracy family in France and England, and on 
his return began a genealogy of the descendants of Lieutenant Thomas Tracy 
of Connecticut, from whom he was a lineal descendant. For ten years his 
leisure evenings were devoted to the work, and the manuscript of a thousand 
pages in his now clear handwriting remains in the hands of his family. This 



MY MARRIAGE 1 30 

Our acquaintance began in 1857, when she entered the 
Rincon School at seventeen years of age as an assistant 
teacher in the primary department. Her early school 
education was obtained in common school and academy 
in Connecticut where she was born in 1839. Her school 
education was supplemented by the watchful care of her 
father, from whom she inherited a taste for literature. 
Our acquaintance grew into a firm friendship, which 
ripened into an engagement of marriage in i860. But the 
sudden death of her father postponed our marriage for 
two years. Our union was a happy one, cemented by 
strong friendship, which ended in a deep and abiding love. 
Though I had not been fortunate up to this time in securing 
wealth in California, I now won a prize .worth more to me 
than all the gold mines in the state. After a life of 
mingled success and failure, of joy and sorrow, we are 
growing old together, surrounded by children and grand- 
children, with no shadow on the sunlight of our fervent 
love which for nearly half a century has known neither 
variableness nor shadow of turning. 

manuscript shows the descent of the Tracy family from Sire de Tracie, a 
Norman baron who served as an officer in the army under William, Duke of 
Normandy, when he invaded England. 

One of his two sons, Thomas Gamier, was a cadet in West Point, at the 
breaking out of the Civil War. He withdrew to take a commission as Lieu- 
tenant in a New York City regiment and served with credit during the war. 



CHAPTER VIII 

MY FIRST POLITICAL CAMPAIGN 

During the first decade of political history in California, 
the Democratic party, in general, carried the election of 
state officers. In 1859 the vote for governor stood as 
follows: Milton S. Latham, Lecompton democrat, 62,000; 
John Curry, anti-Lecompton democrat, 31,000; Leland 
Stanford, republican, 10,000. Two years later (1861) the 
vote for governor stood: Stanford, 56,000; McConnell, 
Lecompton democrat, 33,000; John Conness, anti-Le- 
compton, or Douglas democrat, 31,000. Though Stanford 
was elected by a plurality, his vote was 8000 less than the 
combined votes of the two opposing democratic wings, now 
hopelessly divided on the question of extending slavery 
into the territories. 

Under the pressure of civil war, prominent leaders 
among the republicans and the Douglas democrats pro- 
posed a fusion of the two parties, which was carried into 
effect by a call for a Union party convention, to meet 
in Sacramento in June, 1862. 

One day, a personal friend, the Reverend John Elliot 
Benton, a Congregational minister who took a lively interest 
in politics and public schools, met me on the street in San 
Francisco and said: "Swett, you ought to become a can- 
didate for the office of state superintendent of public 
instruction before the Union Party Convention that is to 
meet next month in Sacramento. You are well known all 
over the state as a successful teacher, and you have 

140 



RUNNING FOR OFFICE 141 

enthusiasm enough to make a good record for yourself and 
do good service for the schools. The state school super- 
intendent is the only state officer to be elected in the com- 
ing election. The new Union party is sure to win. The 
main contest will be for the election of a United States 
senator in 1863." 

The idea of running for public office had never before 
entered my mind, and I told him I would take time to 
think about it. I was devoted to my profession, but I had 
long been chafing under the humiliation of annual reexam- 
inations for certificates valid for only one year. If elected 
state superintendent, I thought I could secure legislation 
which in time might give some kind of a professional 
standing for teachers. On the other hand, up to this time 
no schoolmaster had ever dared to aspire for a state 
office. The politicians in convention had always nomi- 
nated political " workers" for office. Even among county 
school superintendents there were few professional teach- 
ers. As an exception James Denman had been elected 
city school superintendent in San Francisco. It seemed 
like a rash act to risk my position as teacher for a tem- 
porary office. 

Politically I had been a republican from the organiza- 
tion of that party (1856), though I had taken no active 
part in ward politics except in endeavoring to secure good 
men elected as members of the board of education in San 
Francisco. But I had many reasons for supposing that I 
should receive the support of the San Francisco delega- 
tion in the convention. 

On arriving at Sacramento, however, I found that 
Frank Soule of San Francisco had also entered the field 
as a candidate. Mr. Soule was a pioneer resident of San 



/ 



142 MY FIRST POLITICAL CxVMPAIGN 

Francisco, well known as a writer, a journalist, and a 
former member of the legislature. 

One of my strongest friends was James Laidly, who came 
to me shortly before the vote was taken, saying: "Swett, I 
am for you, but Soule is a political friend and I don't want 
to vote against him, so I am going outside when the vote 
is taken." I had become fully satisfied that Mr. Soule 
would receive the nomination, but it was too late for me to 
withdraw. 

My name was placed in nomination by the Reverend 
John E. Benton of Sacramento, seconded by William 
Sherman of San Francisco, and J. J. Owen of Santa Clara. 
Frank Soule was nominated by Mr. Fitch, of El Dorado; 
George W. Reed was nominated by Mr. James McM. 
Shafter, a lawyer and politician of San Francisco, who, in 
the course of his remarks, said that his candidate had one 
advantage over Mr. Swett, — - that of having had .a " clas- 
sical education." It was then moved that the several 
candidates be invited to take the stand and address the 
convention. This unusual action was entirely unexpected, 
and, as I was called out first, without a moment to col- 
lect my thoughts, my speech was entirely offhand. But 
Shafter' s fling about my lack of classical education roused 
my indignation, and my rather forcible remarks won my 
nomination in the face of what had seemed to be certain 
defeat. The hard-fisted miners from the mountain towns 
rallied to my support. The other candidates were called 
out, the ballot was taken, and the result was as follows: 
"Swett, 126; Soule, 96; Reed, 37." Before the announce- 
ment of the vote was made by the chairman, Mr. Reed 
was withdrawn, various transfers of delegates took place, 
and the final vote stood: "Swett, 139; Soule, 105; Reed, 7." 



SPEECH AT THE CONVENTION 143 

The following is the stenographic report of my offhand 
speech : 

Mr. President, and Gentlemen of the Convention: — In making my 
appearance before you to-day, I rise for the first time in my life to speak to a 
political convention, and appear for the first time in my life as a candidate for 
any office in the gift of the people. I am proud that I seek an office so inti- 
mately connected with the profession to which ten years of my life have been 
devoted in arduous labor in the public schoolroom. I am indebted for the 
commencement of my education to a public school in the Old Granite State; 
and whatever I am, I owe to the school system of New England. It was my 
misfortune that, after fitting for college in New England academies, cir- 
cumstances prevented me from entering; but I have endeavored all my life 
to make up this deficiency by patient and persevering study, and I claim 
that though not a college graduate, I am not an uneducated man. 

In defining my political position, I am a Union man. I always have been 
one. I should be recreant to my ancestors if I were not, for my grandfather 
was a good Union man who shouldered his musket in the Revolutionary War; 
and his bones would rise before me if every fiber in my body were not for the 
Union. 

Now it has been said in this convention that the nomination of state 
superintendent is a trifling matter. Gentlemen have said : " Nominate your 
superintendent and let the schoolmasters go home." Gentlemen, you need 
them at home. You never will make California union to the backbone until 
you have a school system so thorough that all the people shall be brought 
into the schools and thoroughly Americanized. Gentlemen, you are taking 
an important step towards making this a "Union State, " in the event of any 
crisis that may arise in the future. 

Cast your eye over the map of our country to-day, and show me a section 
of States from which men shed their blood most freely in battle for the 
defense of the Union, and I will show you that such States have also expended 
the most money for public schools. . . . Why, gentlemen, the men at 
Concord and Lexington who poured out their lifeblood on the 19th of April, 
1775, were graduates of the American common schools. The men of a later 
day who shed the first blood of this civil war answered, on the 19th of April, 
1 86 1, to the tap of the drum, from the schoolhouses of Massachusetts. 

Gentlemen, why is it that these armies of volunteers are invincible when 
gathered in the field ? It is the fact that, behind the guns, there is the intel- 
ligence of the public schools, playing around those loyal bayonets like flashes 
of lightning, making them as invincible as the sword of the Archangel 
Michael. (Applause.) 



144 MY FIRST POLITICAL CAMPAIGN 

The public must be awakened, and the teachers must be encouraged. I 
claim to represent, in some degree, the teachers of this State. If you give 
me this nomination I shall take it as a compliment, not to me personally, 
but to the working teachers who perform regular duties in the schoolroom. 
(Applause.) If you confer upon me this nomination, I do not consider that 
you will give me any additional honor. I believe that the place which I 
occupy now is as honorable as that of superintendent of public instruction. 
If you give me the nomination, I shall thank you for it; and if not, I shall 
go back without a shadow of regret to my duties in the schoolroom, where 
I may do something toward Americanizing the children of this State and 
inspiring them with a love of liberty and a regard for the rights of men. 
(Applause.) 

The Lecompton wing of the Democratic party nomi- 
nated for state superintendent Rev. O. P. Fitzgerald, a 
clergyman of the Methodist Episcopal Church South. A 
wing of the Douglas Democrats that refused to follow 
John Conness into the Union party nominated for the 
same office Jonathan D. Stevenson, colonel of a New York 
regiment of volunteers sent out to California during the 
war with Mexico. 

It so happened that the superintendent of public in- 
struction was the only state officer to be elected in 1862, 
though members of the legislature and county officers 
were included in the election. The vote for state school 
superintendent, therefore, would be taken as an index of 
the relative strength of the three political parties. For 
this reason party spirit ran high, and the campaign was 
waged with intense bitterness. The public-school ques- 
tion was discussed at public meetings as it never had been 
before in California. The press teemed with editorials on 
schools and taxation. 

The state central committee ordered me to stump the 
state, and then left me to take care of myself and pay my 
own expenses. Learning that John Conness was about to 



MISREPRESENTATION AND ABUSE 145 

start out on a stumping tour in behalf of the legislative 
ticket of the Union party, I asked him to take me 
under his wing. He welcomed me cordially, and, as he 
was a veteran politician, a stanch Union man, and an 
earnest supporter of public schools, his aid was invaluable 
to a political tyro like myself. In this stumping tour I 
was allowed ten or fifteen minutes for making a few edu- 
cational remarks as a kind of introduction to the main 
political speech by Mr. Conness. Though unused to public 
speaking, I got through the campaign creditably, because 
I made no attempts at oratory but confined my remarks 
mainly to the needs of the public schools. We filled 
engagements to speak in Sacramento, Marysville, Colum- 
bia, Sonora, Stockton, and many other places of minor 
importance. In this way I became personally acquainted 
with many of the leading Union men of the state. 

I soon became accustomed to the misrepresentation and 
abuse of the opposition press. As I was a member of the 
Unitarian Church in San Francisco, I was held up as an 
" agnostic " and an " infidel." It was charged also that I 
was an abolitionist, and a believer in "amalgamation." 

Thousands of illustrated handbills, after the style of the 
famous coffin handbills in the days of Andrew Jackson, 
were scattered broadcast over the state. These leaflets 
of campaign literature pictured a Yankee schoolmaster 
teaching a mixed class of whites and blacks standing in 
line, with a little negro boy at the head of the class. These 
attacks, however, had little effect on the vote on election 
day, which stood as follows: Swett, 51,238; Stevenson, 
21,215; Fitzgerald, 15,514. 

The Union party had a good working majority of mem- 
bers elected to the legislature, and at the following session 



146 MY FIRST POLITICAL CAMPAIGN 

John Conness was elected United States Senator. Senator 
Conness, born in Ireland but educated in a New York 
City public school, proved to be one of the stanchest 
supporters of the administration of Abraham Lincoln dur- 
ing the stormy period of the Civil War. He was also 
eminently successful in securing important and much- 
needed legislation for the state which he represented so 
honorably and ably. 

After the election I remained in school until I took office, 
December, 1862; but before retiring I delivered an address 
before the City Teachers' Association on the subject of 
"Public Schools and the Commonwealth," from which I 
quote the following paragraphs in order to show the spirit 
which moved me as I was about to enter on my responsible 
duties : 

Let me call your attention to the fact that this war of secession shows 
conclusively that our public schools have been not only the sources of intel- 
ligence and learning, but also the great nurseries of patriotism and devotion 
to constitutional liberty. 

Our American system of common schools was born in the old common- 
wealth of Massachusetts, where it early became an axiom of political econ- 
omy that the only safeguard of republican institutions lies in the general 
education of all citizens of the state; for in a representative government 
public opinion constructs and modifies constitutions, and breathes vitality 
into all laws by which the people are governed. The common schools inher- 
ited democracy from a tough Puritan ancestry, and a stubborn love of liberty 
from the same source. The schoolhouses took up their line of march west- 
ward with the hardy pioneers; they spread over broad prairies and became 
camps of instruction; they poured through the passes of the Rocky Mountains, 
carrying in their train the blessings of liberty and law, and now they stand 
intrenched on the shores of the Pacific, conquerors of a continent and 
guardians of the Golden Gate. General intelligence, industry, prosperity, 
happiness, — all are the products of the common schools; but their crown- 
ing achievement is that they have educated an army of half a million of men 
who have volunteered to sustain the national flag with the bayonet. 

I have taught school long enough in San Francisco to see the boys of my 
first classes grow up into young men. Some of them are in the army, some 



PUBLIC SCHOOLS AND THE COMMONWEALTH 147 

are in the foundries and machine shops and will soon be at work on an iron- 
clad monitor for the defense of our harbor; I find them in the stores, offices, 
and countingrooms; all over the state, wherever I go, I find some familiar 
faces to welcome me; and all these young men are Union to the backbone. 
The money which San Francisco has invested in schools and schoolhouses is 
paying more than two per cent a mouth. In the stress of civil war we begin 
to feel the real worth of free institutions, of sound statesmen, of honest men, 
and of a stable government. In no way can our patriotism take a more 
practical form than that of organizing and perfecting our common-school 
system. 

Our state is one of the richest in its natural resources, favored in climate 
and situation above most other states; but what are lands, and seas, and 
skies, and mines of silver, and mountains of gold, without society, without 
culture and art, without morality and religion, and without free labor and 
free institutions? The Confederates say, "Cotton is king;" some say, "Gold 
is king;" but we say that free labor is a king mightier than both together. 
The real wealth of California lies not so much in gold mines as in the hard- 
fisted men that work them. Intelligent free laborers are working out the 
problem of civilization from ocean to ocean; educated fighting men are con- 
solidating our government on the battle fields, and the common schools, free 
as air, vital as electricity, vivifying as the sunlight, are silently molding 
the life of the nation. In this great national crisis let us consecrate our- 
selves anew to our work in educating the boys and girls that shall preserve 
this government from future disunion and secession. . . . 

It is my purpose to canvass the state, not by haranguing political gather- 
ings, but by visiting schools, by encouraging teachers, and by talking of free 
public schools supported by liberal taxation, in every hall or schoolhouse 
where a dozen men and women will assemble to hear me. If the state 
refuses to pay my traveling expenses, I shall be ready to pack my blan- 
kets as I did in the mines on the Feather River, trudging along on foot and 
foraging on the line of march. 



CHAPTER IX 

OFFICIAL WORK AND PERSONAL REMINISCENCES 

On the first Monday in December, 1862, I began my 
official duties as state superintendent. My predecessor, 
Mr. Andrew J. Moulder, had been allowed to hold his office 
room in San Francisco because that city was then the pub- 
lic-school center, and I secured a similar privilege. Only 
thirty- two years of age, I found myself the youngest of the 
state officials, among whom were Leland Stanford, gover- 
nor, and Frank M. Pixley, attorney-general. Though 
inexperienced in political affairs, I was grimly in earnest 
about extending a free public-school system throughout 
the state of California. I set about my work, bearing in 
mind a saying of Horace Mann: u Be ashamed to die 
before you have won some victory for humanity." 

The term for which I had been elected was fixed by the 
state constitution for three years, but in the election of 
1862 an amendment to the constitution was submitted to 
popular vote and was adopted, which provided that the 
judges of the supreme court and the state superintendent 
of schools should be elected at a special judicial election 
to be held thirty days after the general election. The 
purpose of this amendment was to take these offices "out 
of partisan politics." Thus I was confronted at the out- 
set with an official term cut short to one year, with no 
certainty that I should either be renominated or reelected. 
If I hoped to accomplish anything, concentrated effort was 

needed at once. 

148 



CALIFORNIA SCHOOL LAWS 149 

Before making any outline of my official work, it seems 
essential that I should here briefly outline the successive 
stages of school legislation in California before my adminis- 
tration, in order to make the historical view complete. 

The Beginnings of California School Laws 

The foundation of the public-school system of California 
was laid in the constitutional convention held in Septem- 
ber, 1849, before California was admitted into the Union 
as a state. 

Article IX of the Constitution provided for the election 
by the people of a superintendent of public instruction, to 
hold office for three years, the salary to be fixed by the 
legislature. 

Section II provided that the proceeds of all lands granted 
to the state by act of Congress for the support of schools, 
and the 500,000 acres of public lands granted to the new 
states for the purpose of internal improvements, should 
constitute a perpetual fund to be inviolably appropriated 
to the support of common schools. 

Section III required the legislature to provide for a 
system of common schools by which a school should be 
kept up in each school district for at least three months of 
each school year. 

Section IV provided that the legislature should take 
measures for the protection, improvement, or other dis- 
position of such lands as have been, or may hereafter be, 
reserved or granted by the United States, or any person or 
persons, to the state for the use of a university. 

The first state legislature held after the adoption of 
the state constitution (1849-50) enacted no law what- 
ever to carry into effect the constitutional provisions re- 



I^O PERSONAL REMINISCENCES 

lating to education. At the second legislative session 
(1850-51), a very primitive school law was enacted pro- 
viding for the subdivision of counties into school dis- 
tricts; for a district board of school trustees, three in 
number, elected annually for the term of one year, by 
direct popular vote of school-district electors. ' These 
boards were given power to build schoolhouses, but they 
had no power to levy a tax for building purposes. They 
could examine teachers and issue certificates " valid for one 
year;" appoint teachers for the u term of one year," and 
pay their salaries when the money should come from the 
mythical state school fund. The school trustees were re- 
quired to report directly to the state school superintend- 
ent at the end of each school year. Though as a matter of 
fact there was no "state school fund" in existence, this 
school law provided for the distribution of the interest on 
said fund to the counties according to the number of 
school-census children and, also, to " sectarian and denomi- 
national schools, orphan asylums, and almshouse schools." 
Over this latter provision there was a running legislative 
warfare which was not ended until 1861. This abortive 
school law made no provision whatever for district, county, 
or state school taxes, but left the schools dependent on 
rate bills, tuition fees, and subscriptions, until the appear- 
ance of the dazzling "state school fund" to be derived from 
the future sales of congressional land grants. 

The next succeeding legislature (1852-53) amended the 
school law by authorizing counties to levy a school tax 
"not to exceed three cents on a hundred dollars." It also 
made the county treasurers ex-officio county school super- 
intendents for the purpose of apportioning the beggarly 
pittance thus obtained. It furthermore provided that 



REVISION OF THE SCHOOL Lx\WS 151 

citizens should have power to raise by tax whatever 
amount of money was necessary for school purposes; that 
counties could levy a school tax not to exceed five cents on 
. a hundred dollars ; and that religious and sectarian schools 
should receive a pro rata share of the "school fund." In 
1852-53 the total number of public schools in the state 
was twenty, with an enrollment of 3314 pupils; in 1853-54 
there were 11 1 schools, with an average attendance of 

4635- 

In 1854-55 there was no school legislation, but in 

1855-56 the school law was revised and materially im- 
proved. This law provided for the election of county 
superintendents by popular vote and defined their duties ; 
empowered incorporated cities to raise a school tax not 
exceeding twenty-five cents on a hundred dollars; provided 
by election or by appointment for city boards of education 
and city school superintendents, and authorized counties to 
levy a county school tax not to exceed ten cents on a hundred 
dollars. It also provided that no school should be entitled 
to receive public-school money unless it had been taught 
by teachers duly examined and approved by legal author- 
ity, and that no sectarian books should be used and no 
sectarian doctrines should be taught in any school under 
penalty of forfeiting the public funds. 

The legislature of 1857 made no school amendments 
worth mentioning, but in 1858-59 an advance was made 
which enabled school districts, by a vote of the electors, to 
levy district taxes for the support of schools or for build- 
ing schoolhouses, under the restriction that the district 
should maintain a school four months in the year. A 
special law was passed providing for the sale of the re- 
mainder of the five-hundred-thousand-acre land grant of 



152 PERSONAL REMINISCENCES 

Congress, and of the seventy-two sections for a state 
university. 

In 1860-61 the maximum rate for county school tax was 
raised from ten cents to twenty-five cents on a hundred 
dollars; the state superintendent was authorized to hold 
annually a state teachers' institute, to appoint a state 
board of examination with power to grant state certifi- 
cates valid for two years. County superintendents were 
authorized to appoint county boards of examination with 
power to grant certificates valid for one year. These 
advances in school law were secured in the main by 
Andrew J. Moulder, a graduate of the University of Vir- 
ginia, who was elected state superintendent in 1856, and 
reelected for a second term in 1859. 

Thus ended the evolution of school laws for the first 
decade of common-school history in California. It is evi- 
dent from the preceding brief statement of school organi- 
zation that the general plan resembled that of the state of 
New York rather than that of New England. Indeed, the 
great area and the sparse and scattered population rendered 
township organization impracticable in California. From 
the beginning there were two distinct lines of develop- 
ment; one was that of incorporated cities with their local 
schools provided for by special charters; the other, that of 
rural schools in which the county was the unit of control 
under direct state school law. In this protozoic period 
the people in the centers of population were in a stage of 
school development far in advance of general state legis- 
lation, while the rural district schools were kept up in a 
rude way for three or four months in the year by means of 
tuition fees or rate bills. 

In i86o 7 at the end of the first decade of school history, 



AMENDMENTS 153 

California reported a common-school enrollment of 26,993 
pupils, with an average daily attendance of 14,750, in 593 
public schools, taught by 831 teachers, and conducted at 
an expense of $474,000. The total amount expended for 
common schools during this decade was in round numbers 
$2,586,000. 

Amendments to the School Law, 1862-63. 

After a careful study of the state school law and the 
reports of my predecessors in office, it became clearly 
evident to me that no general improvement could be made 
in the public schools except by first securing a material 
increase in school revenues. My plan of action included 
three lines of attack on the legislature : first, a small state 
school tax; second, an increase in county school tax; third, 
effective means of levying and collecting school district 
taxes. At the opening of the legislature I proceeded to 
Sacramento and secured from the speaker of the assembly 
and the president of the senate the appointment of several 
strong men on the two committees on education. 

In drafting the provisions for county and school dis- 
trict taxes, I was fortunate in securing the efficient aid of 
Daniel J. Thomas, a lawyer in Sacramento, who had been 
a member of the board of education in that city. He was 
an expert in drafting bills of all kinds for members of 
the legislature, and was a strong believer in public schools 
supported by taxation. Mr. Thomas put into exact legal 
form my rough draft of the sections relating to school 
taxes and the collection of rate bills. The school bill was 
then placed in the hands of the assembly committee on 
education and fully explained to them. All the sections 
were approved except the one for levying a state school 



154 PERSONAL REMINISCENCES 

tax, which was to the legislators a new proposition for 
which they feared their constituents were not ready. 
Accordingly I reluctantly withdrew it, but at once planned 
an appeal to the people in the form of a petition to be 
addressed to the legislature that would meet at the next 
session in 1863-64. 

The school bill, as approved by the assembly com- 
mittee on education, was passed by the lower house with 
no material amendment; but in the senate it met with strong 
opposition. By careful management and constant watch- 
fulness, however, I finally secured the passage of the bill. 

This amended school law provided : 

For an effective method of levying and collecting school 
district taxes for building schoolhouses, or for the support 
of schools, and a legal method of collecting rate bills, also 
a slight increase in the maximum rate of county school tax. 

For a state board of examination composed exclusively 
of professional teachers, authorized to issue, on written 
examinations, certificates of three grades, good for four, 
three, and two years respectively, these certificates to be 
renewable without reexamination; also " educational diplo- 
mas" valid for six years, to teachers after three years' 
experience in teaching. 

For county boards of examination consisting exclusively 
of professional teachers, authorized to hold examinations 
in writing and to issue certificates valid for two years, 
renewable without reexamination. 

For the appropriation of a sum not to exceed $150 for 
the expenses of each county teachers' institute, payable 
out of the county general fund; for the election of dis- 
trict school trustees for a term of three years instead of 
one year; for a school record book suitable for recording 



OFFICE WORK 1 55 

the daily attendance of pupils and for keeping other 
statistical records, such school registers to be printed by 
the state printer and supplied at the expense of the 
state; for empowering the state board of education to 
adopt a uniform series of common-school textbooks for use 
in primary and grammar grades in district schools, but 
not including the schools in incorporated cities and towns 
having special boards of education; and for the payment 
of the actual traveling expenses of the state superintend- 
ent, not to exceed one thousand dollars a year. 

Office Work 

After the adjournment of the legislature, I was occupied 
for a month in revising the official blanks required in the 
office, and in drafting forms for a state school register, for 
the various forms of teachers' certificates, and for official 
blanks for school officers. In this work the official blanks 
of the state of Illinois, kindly sent to me by Superintend- 
ent Newton Bateman, proved of very great value. The 
state school register, a modified form of that of Illinois, 
has remained in use for more than forty years without 
material change. My next official document was a special 
circular to school trustees, setting forth their duties under 
the new school law, and closing with the following appeal: 

As school trustees, you are the executive agents of the public-school de- 
partment. On you must depend, in a great measure, the prosperity and 
usefulness of the schools. It cannot be supposed that you will neglect your 
business to visit schools, but you may reasonably be expected to employ good 
teachers, and pay them well; to purchase maps and charts with a small per- 
centage of the county school money; to insist on the adoption of good school- 
books, and to inform yourselves thoroughly concerning all your official duties. 

It may reasonably be expected that if your schoolhouse is meaner than 
half the barns in the district, you will call a district meeting, levy a tax, and 
build a new one. In a recent tour through three of the most fertile counties 



156 PERSONAL REMINISCENCES 

of the state, and among the wealthiest, I did not find a single public school- 
house which ought not to be returned by the county superintendent opposite 
this heading of his report: "Number of Schoolhouses which Disgrace the 
State. " If you fail to carry the vote at the first meeting, try a second, and 
a third. Schoolhouses must be built, and you are the agents whose duty it is to 
build them. You can never make public schools the best schools until you 
provide neat, spacious, and comfortable buildings; and having built a house, 
the grounds should be ornamented with trees, and all the surroundings made 
attractive. And having erected a schoolhouse, and furnished it with modern 
school furniture, your next duty will be to secure a professionally trained 
teacher. 

State Teachers' Institute 

Office work having been completed, I began the pre- 
liminary skirmishing in a battle for a state school tax, by 
issuing a call for a state teachers' institute, to be held 
for five days, in San Francisco, May 4 to 9, 1863. This 
call contained a full program of exercises, and in addition 
an appeal to school trustees, teachers, and the people, in 
favor of increased taxation for the support of schools. 
Two thousand copies of this official circular of twenty-one 
pages were printed and circulated among school officials, 
teachers, and the people. One short quotation will show 
the drift of this appeal: 

Raise the rates of county taxation for the support of common schools ought 
to be inscribed over the doors of every schoolhouse in California. When 
our gold mines are enriching the world; when our valleys are teeming with 
agricultural wealth; when commerce is pouring its treasure into our lap — 
shall we give less for the support of schools than the older states on the 
other side of the continent raise by direct taxation? What are lands, and 
seas, and gold, and silver, compared with men, trained and educated in the 
public schools to an intelligent comprehension of their rights and duties as 
citizens of the state and of the Union? 

While other states are moving onward in a liberal support of schools, ought 
we, in California, entering on a new career of prosperity, — ought we to 
make the war an excuse for relaxing our efforts in behalf of popular educa- 



THOMAS STARR KING 1 57 

tion? As teachers, we are debtors to our profession; and our patriotism, in 
this great crisis of national affairs, ought to incite us to make an earnest en- 
deavor to secure a system of free schools — a system essential to the exist- 
ence of a free people, and to the permanence of a republican government. 

In accordance with this call the teachers and school 
officers, to the number of five hundred registered members, 
assembled in Piatt's Music Hall, then the largest in the 
city. In interest, in enthusiasm, in working power, and 
in results, this convention marked the beginning of a new 
educational era in California. The evening meetings were 
crowded by hundreds of citizens, and the proceedings were 
fully reported by the city press and scattered broadcast 
over the state. 

Thomas Starr King 

Among a large number of able addresses before the 
state institute the evening lecture by Thomas Starr King 
on the "Biglow Papers of James Russell Lowell" was the 
most brilliant. 1 

1 A brief but pithy report of this address was published in the Evening 
Bulletin. This report, written by Dr. Franklin Tuthill, himself an able edi- 
torial writer on that paper, is too good to lie buried in the musty files of a 
daily paper, and I quote it in full: 

" Piatt's Hall was crowded to the extent of its capacity to hear the Rev- 
erend Mr. King's lecture before the Teachers' Institute last evening. Mr. 
King expressed his regret that, by order of his physician, he had been com- 
pelled to cease writing on a lecture specially adapted for an address before a 
meeting of teachers. The audience, which was chiefly one of strangers, did 
not share his regret, however, after he had got fairly started, for "Hosea 
Biglow," they insisted, was "good enough for them," as it was certainly 
the most entertaining of all the lectures with which Mr. King has favored 
us. It is about as hard to read Yankee as to read Choctaw. We are free 
to confess we instinctively shy from the dialect when printed, as boys do 
from Virgil in the original. But with King as an expounder, Biglow looms 
up and assumes proportions he never did assume before. King reads Yankee 
in right royal Penobscot way, as familiarly as though it were his native Ian- 



158 PERSONAL REMINISCENCES 

This was Mr. King's last address to the teachers of Cali- 
fornia. At this time he was engaged in delivering his 
patriotic lectures on "Washington" and "Daniel Webster" 
in all parts of the state. He entered heart and soul into 
the work of raising funds for the Sanitary Commission, 
and it was largely by his eloquent lectures that the people 
of California were moved to contribute, for hospital service, 
more than one and a half million dollars. I recall one occa- 
sion when he addressed, without notes, a crowded audience 
of the citizens of San Francisco in Piatt's Hall. As he rose 
to the highest pitch of patriotic eloquence, men and 
women, time and again, cheered, and cheered, and con- 
tinued to cheer. I have heard in my life many great 
Orators, but I never listened to a grander appeal than 
this. Only one other speech have I ever heard which 
wrought up an audience to an equal frenzy of patriotic 
enthusiasm, and that was delivered in i860, at the 
American Theater in San Francisco by Colonel E. D. 
Baker when he was on his way from Oregon to take his 
seat in the Senate of the United States, at the breaking 
out of the Civil War. The great theater was crowded to 
overflowing, and the orator made the most brilliant speech 

guage and he had been accustomed to strain syllables through his nose from 
infancy. Birdofredum Sawin himself could not have read his odes so well 
as his expounder does. We have been inclined to lament that Lowell had 
not written the Biglow papers in the common English language. The wit 
was so enveloped and hidden in husks and so atrociously uncouth and un- 
comeatable, that it scarcely seemed worth the trouble of picking. As a gen- 
eral thing it is a very cheap kind of wit that lies chiefly in the misspelling 
or mispronunciation of the language. But last evening it was made very 
plain that only through his nose could Biglow have fitly trumpeted forth 
the truths that he favored us with. There is a peculiar adaptation of the 
language he employs to the thought it clothes. With Mr. King to read 
them, the ' Biglow Papers' would prove a joy forever, if not a thing of beauty." 



COLONEL E. D. BAKER 1 59 

of his life. In his peroration he uttered the following 
words, often quoted, but never old: 

Everywhere the great idea of personal liberty develops, increases, and 
fructifies. Here, under the American government, in the land of liberty, 
the chosen of all freemen, the home of the exile, such is not the case. Here, 
in a land of written constitutional liberty, it is reserved for us to teach the 
world that, under the American stars and stripes, slavery marches in solemn 
procession; that under the American flag, slavery is protected to the utmost 
verge of acquired property; that under the American banner, the name of 
freedom is to be faintly heard, the songs of freedom, faintly sung; that while 
Garibaldi, Victor Emanuel, every great and good man in the world, strives, 
struggles, fights, prays, suffers, and dies, sometimes on the scaffold, sorr.e- 
times in the dungeon, often on the field of battle, rendered immortal by his 
blood and his valor, that while this triumphal procession marches on 
through the arches of freedom, we, in this land of all the world — shrink 
back trembling when freedom is but mentioned. . . . 

As for me, I dare not, I will not, be false to freedom. Where in youth 
my feet were planted, there my manhood and my age shall march. I will 
walk beneath her banner. I will glory in her strength. I have seen her, 
in history, struck down on a hundred chosen fields of battle. I have seen 
her friends fly from her; I have seen her foes gather around her; I have seen 
them bind her to the stake; I have seen them give her ashes to the winds, 
regathering them that they might scatter them yet more widely. But when 
they turned to exult, I have seen her again meet them face to face, clad in 
complete steel, and brandishing in her strong right hand a flaming sword, 
red with insufferable light! And I take courage. The genius of America 
will at last lead her sons to freedom. 

Then the vast audience cheered and shouted with a wild 
enthusiasm equal to that which had greeted Starr King. 
Colonel Baker, not long after this, gave up his life on the 
battlefield of Ball's Bluff; and Starr King, two years later, 
worn out by his patriotic efforts in the pulpit and the 
lecture field, gave up his life in San Francisco, as much 
a martyr to the cause of Freedom as was Colonel Baker. 

On the occasions I have mentioned it has always seemed 
to me that both King and Baker fully met the conditions 



160 PERSONAL REMINISCENCES 

of "true eloquence" so clearly set forth by Daniel Webster, 
himself one of the grandest of orators. I still retain a vivid 
picture of the occasions and the speakers, — King, slender, 
scholarly, and youthful, with a voice like the mellow tones 
of a great church organ; Baker, a born warrior, with 
" god-like action," and a voice that rang like a bugle call 
to battle. 

Starr King passed away in 1864. He needs no eulogy, 
for his noble works constitute a monument which will 
endure as long as our state and nation shall be known in 
history. The public schools of our state lost a good friend 
and an able defender. In the midst of all his various 
labors, which seemed to radiate into every department of 
society, he found time to connect himself with the cause 
of popular education. Soon after his arrival in California, 
he delivered an address at the dedication of the San Fran- 
cisco High School. He had partially prepared an address 
on "Public Schools" to be delivered at the State Teachers' 
Institute, but, being prevented from completing it by 
sudden illness, he gave his lecture on "James Russell 
LoweH." Mr. King was engaged to deliver a lecture before 
the State Educational Society on "Teaching as a Pro- 
fession." Two weeks before his death he was also engaged 
to deliver the address to the graduating class of the State 
Normal School. He was the soul of the large Sunday 
school connected with the Church of the Pilgrims, and 
however exhausted by his Sabbath duties, he always 
had a little strength left to cheer the pupils by his pres- 
ence. Teachers coming from the East with letters to 
Mr. King always found him ready to leave his work and 
introduce them to the officers of the school department. 
Many young men in this state will long remember how he 



DUTIES OF THE STATE 161 

extended to them a helping hand. His self-sacrificing spirit 
was marvelous. Those who knew him best loved him 
most. 

Results of the State Institute 

Apart from the professional stimulus given to teachers 
and the awakening of public opinion, the substantial and 
practical results of this teachers' convention may be summed 
up as follows: Action indorsing a state school tax; the 
formation of a state educational society; the establishment 
of an educational monthly journal; the recommendation of 
a uniform list of textbooks ; the issuing of a large number of 
state diplomas and certificates on a written examination. 
A report of the proceedings, including many of the addresses, 
was printed by the state printer in a volume of two hun- 
dred pages, and two thousand four hundred copies were 
distributed among teachers, school officers, and citizens. 

Argument for a State School Tax 

In my institute address on the subject of " Duties of the 
State to Public Schools," I gave a brief outline of the evolu- 
tion of common schools in New England in colonial times, 
traced the history of taxation for school purposes, argued 
at length the proposition that it is the duty of a republican 
government as an act of self-preservation to educate all 
classes of people, alluded to public education in European 
countries, and closed with an appeal in favor of a state tax 
for the partial support of free public schools. This address 
ran, in part, as follows : 

When we stop to ponder on the vital relations which public schools hold 
to our national life; when we begin to perceive, amid the terrible realities of 
war, that the schools have been the nurseries of loyalty, and the lack of them 
the right arm of secession, there is a deep significance in this educational con- 



162 PERSONAL REMINISCENCES 

vention, because it concerns the future stability of the government, and the 
integrity, power, glory, and unity of the nation. Constitutions and laws 
may be bequeathed by one generation to its successors; but patriotism, 
intelligence, and morality die with each generation, and involve the neces- 
sity of continuous training and education. Public opinion, the sum of the 
intelligence of the citizens of the nation, slowly modifies all constitutions, 
and breathes vitality into all laws by which the people are governed. . . . 

" The first object of a free people," says Daniel Webster, "is the preser- 
vation of their liberty." In a government where the people are not only in 
theory the source of all powers, but in actual practice are called upon to ad- 
minister the laws, it is evident that some degree of education is indispensably 
necessary to enable citizens to discharge their duties, maintain and adminis- 
ter the laws, and to retain their constitutional rights. In a government like 
ours, either we must have officers unqualified for their duties, or we must 
provide a system of public instruction which shall furnish a supply of intel- 
ligent citizens capable of discharging their various official trusts with hon- 
esty and efficiency. 

If left to their own unaided efforts, a majority of parents will fail, through 
want of means, properly to educate their children; another class, with means 
at command, will fail through lack of interest. All the children can be edu- 
cated only by a system of free schools, supported by taxation, and controlled 
directly by the people. The early settlers of our country recognized this 
vital principle by providing by law for schools, and by making schools and 
taxation as inseparably connected as taxation and representation are bound 
together. 1 

Common Sense in Teaching 

During the institute session I made a short address on 
methods of teaching in the one-room schools of country 
districts, of which Dr. Tuthill, of the Bulletin, made a con- 
densed report as follows: 

He was not talking of the course of instruction for graded schools but for 
the common schools, especially of the country, where the child that tarries 
longest within school walls gets scarcely over four years of training. In gen- 
eral terms, he held that nine-tenths of all that the arithmetics contain is 
worse than useless to the pupil; that the grammars, grown fat on all other 
grammars from Lindley Murray's down to the present time, are a nuisance 

1 A full report of this address will be found in Swett's "History of the Pub- 
lic School System of California." 



COMMON SENSE IN TEACHING 1 63 

and a bore when forced on little children; that the history which is crammed 
full of dates of unimportant events is not a fit textbook. He gave some 
amusing specimens of the facts, done up in abstractest style, with which the 
best educated children were stuffed centuries ago, and doubted very much 
if a century hence some of our much vaunted methods would not seem quite 
as absurd. He begged teachers not to let arithmetic become the nightmare 
of their schools; not to let their grammar be an incessant tearing to pieces of 
other men's sentences, but to let it teach them how to construct their own 
sentences. Let their arithmetic be, not a perpetual torment of explaining 
why the divisor is inverted in dividing one fraction by another, but the short- 
est process to make out a bill, calculate interest, and the like. The self- 
educated often shame the educated by the schools, because the first learn 
nothing that they do not need to use — hence, what they learn they learn 
well. Napoleon dispensed with baggage in his greatest campaigns, and his 
armies took only what they must use and could not do without. Teachers 
would do well to study his example. A great deal of what is taught in schools 
should properly be headed, "Things worth forgetting." We stuff our chil- 
dren with the names of a thousand dots that we call cities, and of a hundred 
rambling lines we call rivers, and then set them up as proficient in geography. 
Nature expels nine-tenths of it all from their memories as soon as they get 
out into the world. . . . Would that the bookmakers were forced to learn 
the text of one of their own books ! Terrible as the penalty would be, they 
deserve nothing lighter for their sins. (Applause.) 

Children should be trained to a free and easy use of the English language. 
Let them study it in such practical way that they will know how to write a 
letter correctly, and to distinguish an inaccuracy of language the moment it 
is uttered. But just how to do this is one of the most difficult things to say, 
though not so very difficult to do. 

Mr. Swett in this common-sense style explained what and how much of 
physiology, of music, calisthenics, gymnastics, hygiene, and other branches 
should be taught. He urged the point that in all things the teacher should 
be practical — the youngest scholar as surely as the oldest appreciates what 
is practical to him. Mr. Swett was often applauded vigorously, and some 
stern mathematical faces were relaxed into smiles that still must have deemed 
all such sensible talk the rankest kind of heresy. 

Petition for a State School Tax 

During the institute, one of the county superintendents 
introduced a resolution, drafted by myself, requesting the 
state superintendent to prepare a petition for a state 



164 PERSONAL REMINISCENCES 

school tax of half a mill on the dollar to be printed and 
circulated in every school district in California for the 
signature of taxpayers and citizens, and then to be sent to 
the legislature, which was to assemble in the session of 
1864-65. Accordingly I drafted the following brief but 
emphatic petition: 

To the Honorable the Members of the Legislature of the State 
of California: Whereas, We believe that it is the duty of a representative 
government to maintain public schools as an act of self-preservation, and that 
the property of the state should be taxed to educate the children of the state; 
and whereas, the present school fund is wholly inadequate to sustain a system 
of free schools.; we, the undersigned, qualified electors of the state of Cali- 
fornia, respectfully ask your honorable body to levy a special state tax of 
half a mill on the dollar, during the fiscal years 1864-65, the proceeds of the 
same to be disbursed in the same manner as the present state school fund. 

A copy of this petition was sent, through the county 
superintendents, to the clerk of each board of school trus- 
tees, with the request to secure signers and return to the 
county superintendent, and by him to be placed in the 
hands of the legislative delegation from his county, for 
presentation to the state legislature. 

The institute declared in favor of establishing an educa- 
tional journal, and elected as editors myself and Samuel I. 
C. Swezey, nobody else being willing to serve. Mr. Swezey, 
a graduate of the New York State Normal School at Albany, 
was an attorney at law in San Francisco. The work of 
editing the journal was an added burden to my other labors, 
and Mr. Swezey's unpaid assistance was of great value. 
In the first number of this journal (August, 1863) the 
resident editors' department thus set forth the main objects 
of the California Teacher: 

We propose to edit a journal devoted to the interests of teachers, and to 
the establishment of a system of free public schools in the state of California. 



MY FIRST REPORT 1 65 

We intend that its pages shall represent the spirit of the progressive teachers 
of the state. We intend to urge upon teachers the importance of a higher 
standard of professional skill, and the absolute necessity of combining their 
strength and talent in a state educational organization. We intend to urge 
upon school trustees the importance of employing first-class teachers, and 
the necessity of paying them higher salaries, believing that a good school 
taught for six months in the year is better than a poor school kept open for ten 
months. We intend to urge upon the people the pressing necessity of a state 
tax for the support of a system of free schools; and we have faith to believe 
that before this journal ceases to exist the last rate bill will have died out. 

My First State School Report — 1863 

The closing month of the school year was given up to the 
preparation of this report, which made a volume of 214 
pages. The following are some of the main topics touched 
upon: Teachers' wages; errors in statistical reports of 
county superintendents; school trustees; uniform series of 
textbooks; state normal school; school district libraries; 
state college of agriculture and the mechanic arts; state 
school tax; the schools and the state; and the department 
of public instruction. 

The vital part of this report related to the imperative 
need of a state school tax. A few extracts will, in part, 
show the manner in which this subject was presented: 

If one state in the Union needs a system of free schools more than any 
other, that state is California. Her population is drawn from all nations. 
The next generation will be a composite one, made up of the heterogeneous 
atoms of all nationalities. Nothing can Americanize these chaotic elements 
and breathe into them the spirit of our institutions except the public schools. 

As the first step towards the organization of a system of free schools, a 
special state school tax of half a mill on the dollar ought to be levied on the 
assessable property of the state. This would yield a revenue of at least 
$75,000, or about one dollar per census child — or two dollars per child on 
the number enrolled in the public schools. True, this would not make the 
schools free, neither would it continue them ten months in the year; but it 
would give a fresh stimulus to county and district taxation, and in four 
years would, I believe, give the state a system of free schools. 



1 66 PERSONAL REMINISCENCES 

Public opinion in California is in advance of legislation. After traveling 
extensively in different parts of the state, addressing public assemblies, with 
every facility for careful observation, it is my opinion that the people would 
indorse this measure, were it submitted to a popular vote, by an overwhelm- 
ing majority. . . . 

A state tax of half a mill on the dollar was levied last year, and is to be 
levied annually, for carrying on the work of building the state capitol. Shall 
the work of building schoolhouses cease ? By the time the capitol is finished, 
it will have cost more than the value of all the schoolhouses in the state. Is 
it not quite as essential that houses should be erected for educating a hun- 
dred thousand electors, as that a costly pile should be built for the accommo- 
dation of a hundred and fifty legislators ? 

A somewhat extended traveling tour through various parts of the state 
afforded me a good opportunity of "estimating the value" of many of the 
schoolhouses. Language would utterly fail me were I to attempt a descrip- 
tion of these redwood libels on public schools; these uncouth squatters by the 
dusty roadsides; these unpainted, unfenced, unfurnished, unfinished, almost 
uninhabitable hovels — compared with which a miner's cabin of '49 would 
be eminently respectable in appearance. In a new state like ours it is not 
to be expected that either costly or elegant schoolhouses will be erected, 
except in a few cities, for many years to come. But in most parts of the 
state, in towns and villages where costly private residences are numerous, 
where large and commodious churches are built for every denomination, 
where courthouses and jails are imposing edifices, it might reasonably be 
expected that something better than a shanty should be found at the place 
where the children go to school. 

In visiting several of the most prosperous agricultural counties, I do not 
remember having seen a schoolhouse with an inclosed yard, or one surrounded 
by shade trees or ornamented with a single shrub or flower. Many of these 
substitutes for schoolhouses were so wretched that no intelligent farmer would 
think them fit for housing his prize pigs. The stables of wealthy ranchmen 
in the vicinity were elegant edifices in comparison. 

These schoolhouses were mostly built by subscription, and they stand by 
the wayside, like tattered beggars, imploring charitable donations. In many 
districts where the assessable property amounts to half a million dollars a 
tax for building a good schoolhouse would hardly be felt. Until the prin- 
ciple of district taxation for building schoolhouses is more fully recognized, 
the "number of schoolhouses which disgrace the state" will not be materially 
lessened. 

In compliance with the law requiring the state superintendent to travel 
in the different counties in the state at least four months of each year, for the 



OFFICIAL INCIDENTS 1 67 

purpose of visiting schools, of lecturing before county institutes, and of ad- 
dressing public assemblies on subjects pertaining to public schools, I have 
visited the counties of Alameda, Santa Clara, San Mateo, San Francisco, 
Contra Costa, El Dorado, Amador, Sacramento, Solano, Napa, and Sonoma, 
have traveled more than three thousand miles by stagecoach, have deliv- 
ered thirty addresses on public schools, and have visited ninety-five country 
schools. . . . During the first six months of the year, prior to the begin- 
ning of the fifteenth fiscal year, my traveling expenses, amounting to three 
hundred dollars, were paid by myself, the old law, with a liberality like that 
of the "Pickwick Club," kindly allowing the superintendent to visit all the 
schools in the state and lecture in every schoolhouse, provided "no expense 
was incurred to the state" . . . 

I have endeavored to set forth in plain words the defects and the wants of 
our public-school system. It would have been pleasanter to find more to 
commend and less to censure; but unmerited laudation seldom effects needed 
reforms. In entering upon another official term of four years, I am able to 
comprehend in some measure the magnitude of the work to be done, and I 
assume the task in no spirit of self-confidence. I have an ambition to co- 
operate with the many earnest and devoted teachers in California who are 
striving to awaken public opinion to a truer estimate of the relation of free 
schools to the future permanence and prosperity of the commonwealth. 
The efforts of teachers and superintendents, however, will effect compara- 
tively little, unless seconded by judicious legislation. 

I appeal to every legislator, in considering the question of a state school 
tax, to bear in mind that his vote will influence the destinies of a hundred 
thousand children for good or for evil; that the best "franchise" which can 
be granted to the state is a generation of young men trained to an intelli- 
gent patriotism; and that true economy, anticipating the future, sometimes 
consists in liberal expenditure rather than in shortsighted retrenchment. 

Official Incidents 
As I close this account of my first year's work in office, 
there comes to mind an incident which will illustrate the 
manner in which I talked to the people when I went out on 
a visiting tour. At a meeting of the State Teachers' Asso- 
ciation held in Pacific Grove, 1901, an elderly woman, 
somewhat bowed with years, accosted me with the remark 
that she was glad to meet me again. " Where did you ever 
meet me before ? " I asked. 



1 68 PERSONAL REMINISCENCES 

" One day when I was teaching in the town of Santa 
Clara," she said, " a stranger entered the little room into 
which my school children were crowded almost to suffoca- 
tion. He said he wished to visit the school for a few minutes, 
but did not give his name, merely asking me to go on with 
my class. Very soon he asked me if I would allow him to 
speak to the children. After telling the pupils that they 
had a good teacher and that they were intelligent and well- 
behaved boys and girls, he paused a moment and then went 
on as follows: ' You and your teacher are too good for this 
miserable little shanty in which you are crowded so that 
some of you have no desks and some are sitting on the 
platform. I want you to pack up your books when school 
is dismissed, carry them home, and say to your parents that 
the state superintendent of public instruction, Mr. Swett, 
visited you to-day, and directed you to tell them that you 
have struck work, and are not going to school any more 
until you are provided with a better schoolhouse.' Then, 
when the children had gone, you turned to me and remarked 
that you thought that message would wake up the people. 
And it did wake them up. The trustees immediately se- 
cured a larger room, and in the course of the year we had a 
new schoolhouse. This happened long years ago, and I 
have never had a chance to speak to you and thank you 
until to-day for what you did for me and my school." 

In the heavy pressure of my work I had entirely forgot- 
ten this school visit until the words of this teacher brought 
vividly to mind the impulsive way I had, at that time, of 
expressing my indignation against wretched schoolhouses 
and overcrowded schoolrooms. 

On that same visiting tour I had occasion to speak of an 
overcrowded one-room schoolhouse in Oakland, which was 



VISITING TOURS 1 69 

then a small suburban village. The one school building 
that the town then owned had been built by Horace Car- 
pentier at a cost of perhaps a thousand dollars, and as a 
reward for his benevolence the town council granted to him 
a " franchise " covering most of the water front of the future 
city of Oakland. In this school I found some of the children 
seated on boxes and others on the teacher's platform. I 
condemned the condition of the school in scorching terms, 
much to the indignation of some citizens of Oakland; but 
the people next year built a larger schoolhouse. Another 
lecture at Redwood City resulted in the immediate building 
of a spacious schoolhouse. 

In my visiting tours I delivered no elaborately written 
addresses on education in the abstract, but whenever the 
people met me in rural schoolhouses or in public halls I 
talked to them in forcible Anglo-Saxon about their needs 
and their shortcomings, about the pressing necessity of 
raising the rates of county, town, and city school tax, and 
of the imperative need of a state school tax to supple- 
ment local taxes. I believe that in these plain, informal 
home talks I awakened a widespread public opinion which 
enabled me, two years later, to secure effective school 
legislation. 

While on a short visit to the schools in Solano County, 
I dropped into a small district schoolhouse not far from the 
city of Vallejo, where I discovered a teacher managing his 
pupils in a way that excited my admiration. I found that 
his name was Frederick M. Campbell, and that he had been 
a teacher in the city of New York. A few weeks later, on 
a visit to Oakland, I met the Reverend I. H. Brayton, the 
managing head of a small preparatory school for fitting boys 
to enter the little College of California, then in its infancy, 



170 PERSONAL REMINISCENCES 

Mr. Bray ton said to me, "Mr. Swett, can you recommend 
to me a young, earnest, and popular teacher who will take 
charge of this school and build it up ? " 

" Yes," I said, "I know the very man you need, and I am 
willing to stake my life on his success. His name is Fred 
Campbell. Write to him at once to come down to see 
you; you will engage him the moment you set eyes on him." 

Mr. Campbell filled the bill. His well-trained pupils 
constituted most of the first small freshman class in the 
College of California, in Oakland, which became, in 
1869, one of the corner stones of the University of Cali- 
fornia. Subsequently he was elected state superintendent 
of public instruction and then superintendent of public 
schools in the city of Oakland. He has joined "the in- 
numerable caravan," but he will long be remembered for 
his genial qualities and his good educational work. 

I recall a pleasant incident about another young teacher, 
James K. Wilson, who came into my office in search of a 
school. He hailed from the state of Maine. At the out- 
break of the Civil War he had enlisted as a volunteer, 
served out his term of enlistment, and then decided to go 
to California. He was in a discouraged mood. The few 
letters of introduction that he brought with him had not 
enabled him to find employment of any kind, whatever. 
Liking his manner, I said to him, "There is plenty of room 
in California for young men like you; don't get disheart- 
ened." Before he left the office I gave him a letter of 
introduction to the head of a large private school for boys 
in Oakland, which he presented, and secured an immediate 
appointment. Not long after, he became principal of the 
Lincoln Grammar School in San Francisco; next, principal 
of the Boys' High School in the same city; and, finally, the 



STRANDED IN A STRANGE LAND 171 

president of a national bank. A few days ago he met me 
on the street and said, as he gripped my hand: "Swett, I 
am glad to see you. You gave me the first words of hope 
and encouragement I got in California, and I have always 
kept a warm place in my heart for you. Come into the 
bank and see me often." 

There is no part of my official work that I now look back 
upon with so much pleasure as upon the efforts I made to 
find situations for teachers who, on arriving in California, 
found themselves stranded in a strange land. There were 
then no "teachers' agencies," and everybody was told u to 
go to the office of the state superintendent." They came 
singly and by scores. Remembering my own early ex- 
perience, I was always ready to lend a helping hand. If 
their financial condition was desperate, I invited them to 
stay at my own home until I could find places for them; 
and sometimes I advanced them the money to pay their 
fare to remote country schools. It is hardly necessary to 
say, that in all cases this money was promptly returned 
as soon as the teachers received their first payment of 
wages. 

After the close of the Civil War large numbers of young 
men who had served in the Union army, together with 
many who fought in the Confederate ranks, drifted out to 
California. The war was over, and I looked after both 
sides impartially. I recall vividly one day when General 
O. H. LaGrange dropped into my office and told me who 
he was and what he wanted. He had enlisted in the Union 
army as a private from a Western state, served through the 
war, coming out as a brigadier general. He had studied 
law and had come to this state with his wife and child. 
He could find no immediate opening in law, but he said 



172 PERSONAL REMINISCENCES 

he could teach school. He was a splendid specimen of 
robust manhood, and his soul was greater than his towering 
stature. I told him if there was a vacant school in Cali- 
fornia, he should have it. 

In three days I sent him a note asking him to drop 
into my office. When he came I said " General, I have 
heard of a good school at San Leandro, the county seat of 
Alameda County, five or six miles from the city of Oak- 
land. I'll go there with you. When will you be ready to 
march ?" " I'm ready now," said he, and away we started 
on a victorious campaign against the school trustees. He 
succeeded so brilliantly that, six months later, he was 
nominated for the office of district attorney of Alameda 
County and was elected. Next he became superintendent 
of the United States Branch Mint in San Francisco; then 
a lawyer in New York City; next a member of the police 
commission in Roosevelt's time; and he passed his declining 
years in an honorable position as superintendent of the 
United States Soldiers' Home at Santa Monica, near the city 
of Los Angeles. When General LaGrange was appointed 
superintendent of the Branch Mint I called on him to 
inquire if there was any kind of subordinate place in the 
mint for a capable young man, the brother of a very dear 
friend of mine, and the son of one of the organizers of the 
Republican party in California. Without a moment's hesi- 
tation he said, "My dear friend, I'll make a place for him. 
I have felt under lifelong obligations to you for giving me 
my first foothold in California. I'll do anything for a friend 
of yours." He appointed the young man as his private 
secretary. 

At different times I had several ex-Confederate soldier- 
teachers quartered in my own house, waiting to be assigned 



GEORGE BROWN 1 73 

to duty. With one more incident I must close these 
pleasant memories. One day George Brown came into my 
office, and his accent showed that he was born in Scotland. 
He had taught school for a time in Kentucky, and now had 
arrived here, a stranger in search of a school. I liked his 
manner, and said to him, "I know of no vacant school just 
at present, but if you can stay in the city for a week or two 
I think I can place you." He remarked in a pathetic kind 
of a way that he had but little money and could not remain 
long. "Then come to my house and stay until I find a 
place for you." In a few weeks he was sent to a good 
school in Mariposa County, which he taught successfully 
as long as he chose to remain there. Next he came to San 
Francisco, where I secured him a place in an evening-school 
class until he could do better. He was soon promoted to a 
place in the day schools, as vice-principal, and then as 
principal of the Hayes Valley Grammar School, the school 
which is now known as the "John Swett Grammar School." 
After a long and successful career, he resigned his position. 
By his thrifty Scotch habits he had saved a moderate 
competence. When he died he left me a bequest of five 
hundred dollars in recognition of the helping hand I had 
extended to him. 



CHAPTER X 

MY SECOND TERM OF OFFICE, AND THE REVISED 
SCHOOL LAW OF CALIFORNIA 

An amendment to the state constitution, adopted at the 
election in 1862, cut short my term of office from three 
years to one year. Without opposition, I was unanimously 
renominated by the Republican state convention in June, 
1863. At the general state election in September the entire 
Republican state ticket was elected by a sweeping majority 
of twenty thousand. The legislature elect was also strongly 
Republican in both houses, including many members of 
devoted patriotism, marked ability, and abiding faith in 
public schools. John Conness was elected United States 
senator, by this legislature. At the special election in 
October, Judge Sprague was elected to the Supreme Court, 
and I was elected superintendent of public instruction. 

Frederick F. Low, governor, born in Maine, and B. B. 
Redding, secretary of state, born in Nova Scotia, were 
strong believers in public schools, who backed up their 
faith by their works. One of their first acts, as members 
of the state board of examiners, was to approve the bills for 
rent of a hall and for other expenses of the State Teachers' 
Institute held in May, 1863, in San Francisco. These were 
reasonable bills which the state superintendent was au- 
thorized by special appropriation to incur, but which the 
preceding board of examiners during the last year of 
Governor Stanford's administration had declined to audit 
on the ground that the expenditure was extravagant and 

unnecessary. 

174 



STATE SCHOOL TAX I 75 

The main purpose in the school bill submitted to the 
legislature of 1865-66 was to secure a state school tax of 
half a mill on the dollar, and also an increase of county and 
district taxes. During the entire session I was in close 
attendance on the legislature, watching the successive 
stages of the school bill I had prepared. During the first 
thirty days of the session, school-district petitions came 
dropping into the senate and the assembly at the rate of 
from ten to twenty a day, until they seemed innumerable. 
The first petition was headed by the name of John Con- 
ness, United States senator. The legislators gradually 
began to realize that their constituents were in earnest 
about the half-mill tax. The signature of taxpayers to 
these school-district petitions numbered at least ten thou- 
sand, and the petitions were presented, day by day, in 
senate and assembly. One day a leading member of the 
assembly said to me, "For God's sake, Swett, stop these 
endless petitions for a half-mill tax, and we will give you 
whatever you ask for.-' 

With but little opposition the school bill was passed by 
the assembly, but in the senate a fierce attack was made 
upon it by Senators Horace Hawes and James McM. 
Shafter, both from San Francisco. Senator Shafter argued 
that, under this half-mill tax, San Francisco would receive 
back by apportionment only about one-half of the amount 
the city would contribute to the state school funds; but 
his speech only made certain the passage of the bill, because 
it solidified the votes of all the senators from interior coun- 
ties, who saw that their constituents would be the gainers 
by it. The advocates of public schools stood by it and the 
bill was passed. 

The senate, however, attached an amendment which 



176 MY SECOND TERM OF OFFICE 

came near defeating the entire school bill. This was a pro- 
vision giving school trustees power to admit negro, Mon- 
golian, and Indian children into the public schools, which 
was passed by a vote of 25 to 5. The assembly, however, 
refused to concur with the amendment, and after a pro- 
tracted debate, in which strong efforts were made to kill the 
bill, the senate receded, and thus, after a hard contest, this 
decisive measure of a state tax became a law. This school 
bill had the earnest support of Governor F. F. Low; Sec- 
retary of State B. B. Redding; and John Conness, United 
States senator. Among the most active supporters of the 
bill in the state senate were the Reverend John E. Ben- 
ton of Sacramento, C. B. Porter of Contra Costa, and 
Senators Crane, Cunningham, and Foulke. 

I confidently expected that the half-mill tax would prove 
an entering wedge for a higher rate, and my faith was well 
founded. At the next session of the legislature, two years 
later, the rate of state school tax was raised from five cents 
on each hundred dollars to eight cents; and a few years 
later, the state tax was fixed at a rate sufficient to raise a 
school revenue equal to seven dollars per capita for each 
school-census child, at which it still stands in 19 10. In 
1864-65 the state school tax yielded $55,000; in 1900, it 
yielded $1,700,000. 

Another provision in the school bill, hardly less important 
than that of the state half-mill tax, was a section requiring 
each county to levy a county tax sufficient to raise at least 
two dollars per capita for each school-census child between 
four and eighteen years of age. This seemingly innocent 
and reasonable provision, which encountered no opposi- 
tion in either house, really increased the school revenue by 
a sum greater than that derived from the state tax, rais- 



MY BIENNIAL REPORT 1 77 

ing the rate of county school tax in many of the southern 
counties from live cents on one hundred dollars, to thirty 
cents on each hundred dollars. Before this act there had 
been no minimum rate of county school tax fixed by law. 
Of maximum rates the statutes were full. The first 
maximum rate was three cents on one hundred dollars; 
the next, ten cents; the third, twenty cents; the next, 
twenty-five cents; the latest, twenty-five cents. During 
all this period there had been no minimum rate, so that 
county supervisors had not been required by law to levy 
any county school tax whatever. 

The school bill of 1864-65 also made it the imperative duty 
of the school district trustees to levy a district school tax 
sufficient, when added to other school moneys, to maintain 
a free public school for five months in each year, provided 
the revenue from state and county moneys was not sufficient 
for that purpose. 

Mainly by the efforts of Governor Low and B. B. 
Redding, secretary of- state, a special act was passed at 
this session which provided for the gradual funding of the 
indebtedness of the state to the school fund, which at this 
time amounted to $475,000. The necessity of some such 
action was occasioned by the plain fact that as fast as school 
lands had been sold the legislature had appropriated the 
proceeds to pay current expenses. 

My Biennial Report, 1864-65 

My biennial report for the school years 1864 and 1865 was 
submitted to the governor, as required by law, November i, 
1865. The school year in this state begins on the first 
day of July of each year and ends on the 30th day of June, 
in order to correspond with the state fiscal year. This 



178 MY SECOND TERM OF OFFICE 

report, a volume of 422 pages, was a full exposition of the 
educational condition of the state. In addition to statis- 
tical tables, the following topics were treated at length: 
Average length of schools; teachers' wages; school law; 
amendments to school law; school libraries; school teachers; 
the land-grant college; state and county boards of exami- 
nation; improvements in methods of teaching; course of 
study for ungraded country schools; common sense in 
teaching; physical training; moral training; the Bible in 
the public schools; school discipline; public schools and 
taxation. 

Attached to this report was an historical sketch of the 
evolution of the public-school system of California. This 
condensed history of one hundred pages gave an outline of 
the successive school laws, abstracts of the reports of state 
superintendents, and full tables of school statistics. It was 
made up from the records of the school department, from 
the journals of the state legislature, and from newspaper 
files. 

It seemed to me a fitting time to gather up for future 
reference the fragmentary records of the schools during 
their early struggles; to trace their progress step by step; 
and to hold in remembrance the names of the men who 
were the more immediate agents in organizing schools, and 
who laid, by wise legislation, the foundations of their present 
prosperity. No complete file of state school reports existed 
at that time except in the legislative journals. Therefore 
I gleaned from the confused material something like a con- 
nected history of school legislation, reports, and statistics. 

The financial exhibit for 1865 showed an increase of 92 
per cent in the amount of school moneys raised by direct 
taxation over the amount in 1864; the average length of 



MY BIENNIAL REPORT 1 79 

schools had been increased nearly one month; the average 
amount of school revenue from all sources had reached 
$2.58 per census child; and more than half the public-school 
pupils were relieved from rate bills. But there was a vital 
and intangible aspect which no statistics could exhibit. 
The stronger hold which the schools had taken on public 
opinion; the greater skill, earnestness, and ability of teach- 
ers; the improvement in methods of instruction and classifi- 
cation; the greater interest and enthusiasm of pupils, conse- 
quent upon the introduction of better books; the greater 
interest of parents; the civilizing agency of well-conducted 
schools in cities and incorporated towns, — these could not 
be expressed in figures nor conveyed in the words of an 
official report. 

Sixteen pages of this report were devoted to the recom- 
mendation of amendments to the school law and an ex- 
planation of their necessity. One of the most important 
provisions related to school libraries. The need of school 
libraries was self-evident. We were entering on a new era 
in our public-school system — that of free schools . The time 
had come for acting. This recommendation was adopted 
in the school bill for the legislative session of 1865 and was 
passed without objection. It has remained on the statute 
books for more than thirty years with little change. Dur- 
ing the past decade — 1890 to 1900 — this library money 
was chiefly used to supply the schools with sets of supple- 
mentary reading matter. 

The state legislature ordered 4600 copies of my report 
printed, of which number the superintendent was allowed 
two thousand for general distribution and for Eastern ex- 
change. Copies were sent to one thousand teachers in 
California, to state and city superintendents in other 



180 MY SECOND TERM OF OFFICE 

states; to educational journals and to public libraries. 
The Eastern educational journals highly commended it, 
and many distinguished educators sent me letters of 
approval. 1 

I have treated at length of the school law of 1866 because 
it represents the culmination of my study of the school 
system of other states, of my official experience, and of my 
persistent efforts with preceding legislatures to secure school 
legislation as the foundation on which to build up a public 

1 Professor William Russell, of Massachusetts, wrote to me as follows: 

" Your Biennial Report is one of the most valuable documents that has 
appeared of late years, on the great subject of popular education. It seems 
to me most happily adapted to the circumstances of the Pacific States. 
... I need hardly tell you how much your course in California is doing 
to win the warm sympathy and best wishes for your success of all the work- 
ing corps of teachers in New England. Your noble report is full of inspira- 
tion to the heart of every earnest worker in whatever part of the great field of 
education." 

The Pennsylvania Journal of Education said: "Would that every sister 
state were in possession of a general school law equally comprehensive in its 
provisions, as methodical in the arrangement of its sections, and to as great 
degree divested of all mere verbiage and unnecessary legal technicalities. 
In its style and general provisions this is a model school law, and under its 
working, ably administered, as we know it will be, the El Dorado of the 
Pacific will make such bold strides onward as may render it necessary for 
older states to look well to their laurels." 

Henry Barnard's American Journal of Education (1866) devoted ten pages 
to a notice of the California school law and the biennial report of 1864-65, 
and closed with the statement: "There is nothing so liberal in the way of tax- 
ation in any other state in the world. Superintendent Swett has, in this 
noble contribution to the interests of national education, laid our whole 
country under lasting obligations; and it is a highly gratifying indication of 
its value, that California's younger sister, Nevada, has adopted, for the 
molding of her public-school system, that of her elder sister, as matured and 
perfected by the indefatigable exertions of one whose long professional 
experience and peculiar qualifications for his present office, give such force 
to all his suggestions, whether regarding methods of instruction or legisla- 
tive measures for the diffusion of education." 



FINANCIAL EMBARRASSMENT 181 

school system in California. The quotations that I have 
dragged out of the oblivion of official school reports have 
seemed better to represent the spirit of my work than any- 
thing I could now write about it. As a recognition of my 
educational work the College of California this year gave 
me the honorary degree of A.M., and soon after I received 
from Dartmouth College a similar degree. I have never 
made use of either, but I fully appreciate both compliments. 
In addition to the strain of official life, I was worried at 
this time by financial embarrassment. In 1859, while on 
a visit to the Buena Vista vineyard of Colonel Haraszthy 
in Sonoma Valley, captivated by the beauty of the country 
and the glowing visions of the future profits of the grape 
culture, I was induced to buy from him a forty-acre tract 
of land and enter into a contract with him to plant it and 
cultivate it for three years, payable from year to year. I 
had long been dreaming of. a small place in the country to 
which I could retire when worn out by teaching, and here 
seemed to be my opportunity. It is enough to say that, 
when it came into bearing, the vineyard crop did not pay 
the expenses of cultivation. Then the Civil War came on 
and there was no market for grapes. But I held on to it 
with a death grip, until it not only absorbed all my earn- 
ings, but compelled me to hire money at a high rate of 
interest to carry it on. Finally, like most of the pioneers 
in viticulture, including Colonel Haraszthy himself, I be- 
came financially involved with two partners, and was 
forced to sell out for the face of the mortgage. This was 
a severe loss, and the scar long remained; but fortunately 
the pressure of official duties was so great that I had little 
time to mourn over it. 



CHAPTER XI 

MY FINAL BIENNIAL REPORT 

My final state school report was a volume of three hun- 
dred pages, which included, in addition to the usual statis- 
tics, summaries, and comments on schools, a discussion of 
the following educational topics: The inspection of schools; 
school discipline; the self-reporting system; religious ex- 
ercises in school; moral training; coeducation; national 
Lincoln monument subscription; State College of Agricul- 
ture and the Mechanic Arts; the American system of pub- 
lic instruction; a general summary of public-school progress 
in school law and methods of instruction, from 1862 to 
1867. As an appendix the " Revised School Law ' of 
1866, covering fifty pages, was published in full. 

The school year ending June 30, 1867, marked the tran- 
sition period of California from " rate-bill " common schools 
to an American free-school system. For the first time in 
the history of the state, every public school was made 
entirely free for every child to enter. In the smaller dis- 
tricts, having less than one hundred children and less than 
$200,000 taxable property, free schools were maintained 
three months; in the larger districts, having more than 
one hundred children and $200,000 taxable property, free 
schools were kept open five months. More than twenty- 
one thousand pupils attended free schools during the entire 
school year of ten months. A system of free schools, sup- 
ported by taxation, was at last an accomplished fact. 

When I assumed the duties of office in 1863, I saw clearly 

182 




John Swett in 1866 



183 



1 84 MY FINAL BIENNIAL REPORT 

that it was useless to expect to improve the character of 
the public schools to any considerable extent without a 
largely increased school revenue, derived from direct taxa- 
tion on property. At the session of the legislature in 
1863-64, I secured a state school tax of five cents on the 
hundred dollars, which gave an additional school revenue 
of $75,000 a year. A bill was also passed providing for 
the gradual funding of the indebtedness of the state to the 
" School Fund," then amounting to $600,000. At the next 
session, in 1864-65, a further school revenue was secured 
by providing that the minimum county school tax should 
be equal to two dollars per census child. This little clause 
gave an additional county school revenue of $75,000. In 
1866-67, by the passage of the revised school law, the 
state school tax was raised to eight cents on the hundred 
dollars, and the minimum county tax was raised to three 
dollars per census child, both provisions together increasing 
the school revenue by at least $125,000 a year. I need not 
say that to secure an additional school revenue of $300,000 
per annum, in the face of the high county, state, and national 
taxation, during a period of civil war, was no holiday task. 

During each of three sessions of the legislature I had 
been a persistent member of the " Third House," arguing, 
soliciting, meeting committees, and patiently waiting, with 
a determination to secure for every child in California a 
right, guaranteed by law, to an education under a system 
of free schools based upon the proposition that the property 
of the state ought to be taxed to educate the children of the 
state. 

It was evident that even after the revenue was provided, 
the schools would be to some extent a failure, unless pro- 
tected from incompetent teachers by a thorough system of 



THE REVISED SCHOOL LAW 1 85 

state examinations and certificates. The schools cannot' 
rise higher than the teachers. The second leading object 
of my administration was to secure professional teachers, 
and to elevate the occupation of teaching. 
* In 1862 only 50 per cent of the census children were en- 
rolled on the public school registers; in 1867 the percentage 
of enrollment was 66. In 1863 the average public-school 
attendance was 20,000; in 1867 it was 46,000. In 1862 
the amount of state school money apportioned was $75,000; 
in 1867 it was $269,000. In 1862 the amount raised by 
county taxes was $146,000; in 1867, $303,000. In 1862 the 
total receipts from all sources of school revenue amounted 
to $497,000; in 1867, to $1,287,000. In 1862 the amount 
paid for teachers' salaries was $303,000; in 1867, $696,000. 
In 1862 the total expenditures for public schools amounted 
to an average percentage of thirty cents on each hundred 
dollars of the assessment roll of the state; in 1867 the ex- 
penditures amounted to fifty-eight cents on each hundred 
dollars, besides leaving a surplus on hand for the next 
year of $150,000. 

The Revised School Law of 1866 

This school law, entitled " An Act to provide for a system 
of common schools," was approved by Governor Frederick 
F. Low, March 24, 1866. 

Early in the session of 1865-66 I submitted a series of 
school-law amendments to the senate committee on edu- 
cation. The amendments were so extensive that the com- 
mittee referred the entire law to me for revision. At this 
time neither the committee of the senate nor the assembly 
had a clerk or secretary, and I acted in that capacity for 
both branches of the legislature. The school bill was 



1 86 MY FINAL BIENNIAL REPORT 

adopted, with a few slight changes. The bill, as submitted 
by the committee, passed the senate with only a few unim- 
portant amendments, and the assembly in the same manner. 

The more important advances gained by this law may be 
briefly summed up as follows: 

i. A state board of education of nine members, and a 
board of state normal-school trustees of eight members; 
authorizing the state board of education to adopt rules, 
regulations, and a course of study for district schools, and 
to adopt a uniform state series of textbooks for such 
schools. 

2. Providing that the legislature should furnish the 
state superintendent with at least two thousand copies of 
each biennial report for distribution among school officers 
and libraries. 

3. Providing for the payment of necessary expenses for 
county teachers' institutes out of the county school fund. 

4. Requiring the district clerk to furnish the schools 
with pens, ink, stationery, and school incidentals, at the 
expense of the district. 

5. Providing for the legal establishment of separate 
schools for children other than white children. 

6. Limiting the school hours of children under eight years 
of age to four hours a day, exclusive of intermission. 

7. Establishing a system of school libraries by the reser- 
vation of ten per cent of the state school apportionment. 

8. Authorizing a state subscription for an educational 
journal, two copies for each school district, one for the 
district clerk, and one for the school library. 

9 . Life diplomas for teachers having ten years ' experience ; 
city boards of examination; recognition of the normal 
school diplomas of other states; all boards of examination, 



FREE SCHOOLS AT LAST 187 

whether state, city or county, to be composed of professional 
teachers only. 

10. A state tax of eight cents on each hundred dollars of 
taxable property; a minimum county school tax of three 
dollars per census child; and a maximum tax of thirty-five 
cents on each hundred dollars. 

11. Authorizing and requiring school trustees to levy a 
district-school tax sufficient to keep a free school five 
months in a year. 1 

Free Schools At Last 

In my biennial report for 1866-67 I stated that in 1867, 
for the first time in the history of the state, all the public 
schools were kept free to all pupils for a period of from three 

1 On this school law Professor Benjamin Silliman, of Yale University, made 
the following comments in an address at the commencement exercises of the 
College of California in 1867: 

"By the admirably digested law of 1866 the people of California, in their 
'Act to provide for a system of common schools,' have laid the foundation 
and set up the framework of the best system of general common-school edu- 
cation for the whole people which exists in any state or country where the 
English language is spoken. If the compulsory system of Prussia is more 
mandatory, we should hesitate long before exchanging for it the free scope of 
our own. Your distinguished superintendent of public instruction has done 
for the future of California what it rarely falls to the lot of any one man to 
accomplish, — the molding and training of the youthful minds of this and 
succeeding generations in the elements of a sound education upon a broad 
and liberal basis, — rich in the best fruits of a long and successful experi- 
ence drawn from all sources. The full measure of practical wisdom embodied 
in this organic Act can be seen in its best development only as time crowns 
it with the fruits of successful trial; it lays broad and deep the foundation of 
intelligence and virtue in the commonwealth. . . . The same wisdom 
that has framed a law so catholic and ample as the common-school system 
will not fail when applied to the development of the details of the state 
university system which is its logical sequence — its indispensable supple- 
ment and crown. 



1 88 MY FINAL BIENNIAL REPORT 

to ten months in the year, according to the number of school- 
census children and the taxable property of the school 
districts. This fact marked an epoch in the school history 
of California. The deathblow had been given to rate bills. 

The Bible Question 

For many years there had been more or less discussion 
in the public press and at teachers' institutes about the 
reading of the Bible in public schools. The school law 
contained no provision for or against the reading of the 
Bible in school, and the matter was left to the local option 
of cities and school districts. In drafting the several school 
bills of my administration, I left this question as it had been 
left from the beginning in California, one of local option. 
But from time to time, for this reason, I was attacked by 
some denominational zealots and some designing politicians 
as an agnostic and an infidel. Therefore, in my second 
biennial report I defined my position by making the follow- 
ing statement: 

Concerning the use of the Bible in public schools, there is a wide diversity 
of opinion. By some it is held that the Bible should be placed in the hands of 
school children, and used as a daily reading book; by some, that it should 
be used by the teacher only for reading short select passages; and by others, 
that it should not be read at all. The fact that the state school law has never 
contained any statutory provision either prohibiting or requiring the reading 
of the Bible in school, would seem to indicate that legislators have had doubts 
as to the right of the state to compel its use without conflicting with the reli- 
gious liberty of its citizens. The Jew sends his children to the public school; 
and he holds the reading of the New Testament to be an interference with 
religious liberty. The Catholic objects to the old English translation of the 
Scriptures, and the Protestant to the Douay version. Therefore the deci- 
sion of this question has wisely been left to local boards and trustees, who 
are supposed to represent the more immediate wishes of the people whose 
children attend school. In the schools of this state teachers who desire to 
read select passages of the Scripture in school are seldom interfered with by 



THE BIBLE QUESTION 1 89 

either school trustees or parents. Both teachers and trustees have had too 
much good sense to attempt to force the daily reading of the Bible, when it 
would offend the religious prejudices or convictions of any large class of 
parents whose children attend the public schools. Every formal resolution 
to make the Bible a textbook in the common school has been voted down in 
state teachers' institutes and conventions; yet many of the same teachers 
who so voted were accustomed to read the Bible in school every day. The 
present is an age of the largest and broadest personal liberty of religious 
opinion; the children of all classes are found in the common schools, and 
school officers and teachers should manifest a tender regard for the religious 
scruples of both Jew and Gentile, Protestant and Catholic, and hold the 
schools free from any violation of the great principles guaranteed by the 
national and state constitutions, that every man be left free to worship God 
as he pleases, and to teach his children his own religious faith. The great 
purpose of the common school is intellectual and moral culture, as a founda- 
tion. It is left for the home, the Sunday school, and the church to teach 
forms of religious faith and worship. If each does its work without inter- 
ference with the other, the result will be harmonious. If the church attempts 
to make the public school a Sunday school, the result will be disastrous. 

After an interval of nearly forty years, it is with some 
degree of satisfaction that I call attention to the fact that 
the Bible question still remains one of local option. Fur- 
thermore, in all the cities and the larger towns, without 
exception, public opinion has decided against Bible reading 
in school, and the custom is retained only in a few rural 
districts having a homogeneous people among whom there 
are no objectors to such reading. 

My final state report closed with the following leave- 
taking : 

My term of office is now drawing to a close. I have not found the office 
a sinecure; I have not eaten the bread of idleness or of ease; for the past four 
years my work has been the hardest of my life. Traveling and lecturing 
more than half the time, attending county institutes, editing the California 
Teacher, the official school journal, conducting state examinations, twice 
revising the school law, attending three sessions of the legislature to secure 
the passage of amendments, preparing rules and regulations and courses of 
study for the public schools, answering the extensive correspondence conse- 



190 MY FINAL BIENNIAL REPORT 

quent upon so many radical changes in school laws, preparing state reports 
and historical sketches of education — my powers of endurance have been taxed 
to the utmost limit. I sought the office for the purpose of raising the stand- 
ard of professional teaching and of organizing a state system of free schools. 
I am willing to leave the verdict to the future. If, when my present term of 
office expires, I fall back into the ranks as a private, I shall feel proud of my 
profession, for I hold none more honorable, and to it I expect to devote my 
life. 

I love the state of my adoption; I am proud of her educational record. 
I hope to see California as distinguished for her common schools, her colleges, 
her institutions of learning, as she has been for the enterprise of her people 
and the mineral wealth of her mountains; for the solid wealth of any state 
consists in educated and industrious men and women. If the common schools 
are kept up to the full measure of their usefulness, her future glory will be, 
not so much in her mines, her scenery, or her climate, as in the intelligence, 
integrity, and patriotism of a people that shall make wealth a servant of 
science, art, literature, and religion. 



State Teachers' Institute, 1867 

The fourth State Teachers' Institute assembled in the 
Lincoln schoolhouse, San Francisco, September 19-24, 1865, 
and was held without any state appropriation. The most 
important purpose for which it was convened was the 
holding of an examination of applicants for state diplomas 
and certificates. Among the formal addresses were: "The 
State and the Schools," by the Reverend John Eliot 
Benton; "A Practical Education," by Professor Martin 
Kellogg; " Physiology and Hygiene," by Henry P. Carl- 
ton, of the State Normal School; "Moral Training," by 
the Reverend S. H. Willey, of the College of California. 
An evening ticket lecture on "Queer People and Queer 
Places," by J. Ross Brown, netted the sum of fifty-four 
dollars for the State School Journal. An evening lecture 
was given on "Natural Philosophy," by George W. 
Minns, of the State Normal School, and State Superinten- 



INSTITUTE ADDRESS 191 

dent Swett gave a lengthy address on "The State School 
Law." 

The fifth institute, which met in San Francisco, May 
7-iij 1867, was attended by about five hundred teachers. 
Among the addresses and papers were the following, in 
part: "The Teacher's Motives," by the Reverend Charles 
G. Ames; " Self-improvement," by Dudley C. Stone; 
"Readiness," by the Reverend John E. Benton; "State 
Educational Progress," by State Superintendent Swett. 

Before adjournment the convention adopted the follow- 
ing resolution by unanimous vote: 

" Resolved, That we look upon the official career of our able and ener- 
getic state superintendent, the Hon. John Swett, with admiration. That 
by the greatness of the results he has accomplished, by the wisdom of the 
measures he has inaugurated, by the conspicuous fairness and impartiality 
of his dealings with all who have business with the office of Public Instruc- 
tion, and by the genuine integrity of his character, he reflects honor upon 
the State that he serves so ably, and is eminently worthy of the continued 
confidence of the people of this State." 

From my institute address, delivered at the opening of 
this meeting, I rescue from oblivion a few selections setting 
forth the educational advance made during the five years 
of my administration. 

STATE EDUCATIONAL PROGRESS 

Four years ago, many of you now before me were present at the largest 
and most enthusiastic gathering of teachers that had ever assembled in this 
state. I remember well the circumstances under which we met. The army 
of the Potomac had been driven back from the disastrous field of Chancel- 
lors ville; and woundsd, bleeding, and exhausted, the nation seemed to be 
gathering its' power for the final wager of battle which should determine its 
fate forever. . . . 

The old flag of a new nation now floats over every foot of the old republic, 
and everywhere under its protecting folds every human being may claim 
the right of free labor, free speech, free thought, and free schools. . . . 

Since the institute of 1863, our public schools have been quietly and peace- 



192 MY FINAL BIENNIAL REPORT 

fully revolutionized. In the grand events of national history, in the build- 
ing of cities, the construction of roads, the settlement of land titles, and the 
excitement of life incident to a new state, the progress of schools is hardly 
noticed except by those who are most directly interested in them. Then, 
we had little to be proud of in our educational record; now, California will 
not suffer by comparison with the most progressive states in the Union. 

Then, the total expenditure for schools amounted to a percentage on the 
assessment roll of the state of thirty cents on each one hundred dollars; now, 
it amounts to more than fifty cents on the one hundred dollars. 

Then, the teacher had no system of professional examinations, no organi- 
zation, and little professional pride. In fact, a man generally apologized for 
being forced to resort to teaching until he could find something else to do. 

Then, the "schoolmasters" of San Francisco were examined every year 
by doctors, lawyers, dentists, contractors, and business men, to "see if they 
were fit to teach the common school" another year. There was no standard 
of qualification, except the caprice of "accidental boards." Throughout 
the state, examinations were oral, and in most cases they resulted in issuing, 
to everybody who applied, a certificate "to teach school one year." 

Now, California teachers have gained the legal right to be examined exclu- 
sively by the members of their own profession, and we have just cause to be 
proud of the fact. It has already done much to make the occupation of 
teaching respectable. It has relieved good teachers from useless annoyance 
and humiliation; it has increased their self-respect, stimulated their ambition, 
and guarded the schools against quacks and pretenders. 

It was my sanguine hope for many years that, in this new state, teaching 
might aspire to the dignity of a profession; that teachers might learn to com- 
bine their strength, respect themselves, command the respect of others, and 
honor their occupation. It has been and is my highest ambition to elevate 
the profession of teaching, for I well know that in no other way can the public 
schools be made the great educators of the state and the Nation. If the 
citizens of this state desire to have good schools, they must pay professionally 
trained teachers high salaries. 

It is only by raising the standard of attainments that the occupation can 
become well paid and respected. Set the standard high, and high wages will 
follow; set the standard high, and good schools will be the result; set the 
standard high, and teachers will be content to remain in the schools. 

Four years ago county institutes were held in only two or three counties 
.in the state; now, the law requires one annual institute in every county hav- 
ing at least ten school districts, and further requires that teachers shall attend 
and that trustees shall allow their wages to continue during the time of at- 
tendance. In this particular it is the most progressive law on record. 



INSTITUTE ADDRESS 1 93 

Our revised school law has received the warmest approbation from many 
of the most distinguished educators of the United States. Honorable Newton 
Bateman, Professor William Russell, Henry Barnard, Wm. H. Wells, John 
D. Philbrick, John S. Hart, and many others, unite in the opinion that the 
school law of California is one of the best in the United States, and in some 
points decidedly in advance of any in the older states. Our reports are found 
in every large library and reading room in the United States; are in the hands 
of all the prominent educators of the East; are sent to the Departments of 
Instruction in Europe, and are still requested by letters which arrive with 
almost every steamer mail. 

Fellow teachers, the work is in your hands. All the machinery of school 
law, all the money raised by school taxes, all the schoolhouses built, are of 
little avail if you fail in the final work of actually forming and molding mind 
and character. But your work is not, indeed, limited to the schoolroom 
alone. You must make your influence felt on society. Attend the county 
institutes, write essays, and engage in debates and discussions. Write for 
the local papers. Subscribe for and read carefully a few of the best school 
journals, and learn what is going on in the educational world. Instead of 
complaining about the lack of interest on the part of parents, visit every 
family in the district, and wake up the fathers and mothers from their leth- 
argy. Hold frequent examinations and exhibitions for the purpose of bring- 
ing the people in direct contact with the school and its influences. Start a 
subscription to increase the school library. A little money directly from the 
pockets of the parents will lead to a better appreciation of the value of books. 
Harass the trustees until they purchase school apparatus, furnish new desks, 
or build a new schoolhouse, if one is needed. If a special tax is necessary, 
canvass the district for it with the zeal and earnestness of a professional poli- 
tician. Visit other schools, read new works on education, and adopt new 
methods of instruction. If you wrap yourselves up in your own conceit, and 
imagine that nobody can tell you anything about "keeping school," you 
will never rank among the progressives. 

If the teacher be a man among men, he will command respect; but if he 
confines himself to the schoolroom, if he deals only with books and boys, if 
he writes nothing, says nothing, and does nothing, society will be certain to 
estimate him by value received. The true teacher should be a thinker and 
doer. The scholarship required of the teacher is a peculiar one. There is a 
sham scholarship which prides itself on diplomas, flaunts Latinized phrases, 
and ignores plain Saxon. There are pedants who hide their shallowness 
under the veil of dullness. Like Wouter Van Twiller, the old Dutch Gover- 
nor of New York, they gain credit for knowing a vast deal by saying nothing 
at all. But any teacher with his intellectual and spiritual faculties in good 



194 MY FINAL BIENNIAL REPORT 

working condition can be a scholar, whether educated in the schools or out 
of them. 

We are apt to consider immediate results rather than their remote causes; 
and hence the power of the public schools is seldom realized. Light, heat, 
and electricity build up the material life of the globe out of inorganic matter 
so slowly and silently that we hardly observe the workings of their subtle 
agencies. So the schools act upon society, and organize its life out of the 
atoms of undeveloped humanity attracted to the schoolrooms. 

A few weeks since I visited one of the great quartz mills in the interior of 
the state. I descended the deep shaft where stalwart men were blasting 
and delving in solid rock. Above, the magnificent mill, with fifty stamps, 
like some gigantic monster, was crushing and tearing the white quartz with 
its iron teeth; and I saw the immediate result of all this work in the heavy 
bars of pure gold, all ready to be stamped with their commercial value and 
to enter into the great channels of trade. Then I entered a public school a 
few rods distant, where a hundred children were sitting, silently learning 
their lessons. I realized the relation of the mill and the mine to the ma- 
terial prosperity of the state; but the school, what did it yield ? 

I rode over the line of the Central Pacific Railroad from the springtime 
of Sacramento into the snowy winter of the Sierras, and I saw the beginning 
of the great commercial aorta of a continent. On its cuts and embank- 
ments and rails and locomotives more money had already been expended 
than has been paid for schools since the history of our state began. I could 
see the tangible results of the labor expended upon the road; but where 
should I look for the value received to balance the cost of the schools ? After 
thundering down on its iron rails from the mountain summit, I stepped into 
the Sacramento High School, and thought to myself: What are these boys 
and girls doing, compared with the men who are paving the great highway 
of a nation ? 

I go out into the streets of this great city; I hear everywhere the hum of 
industry; I see great blocks of buildings going up under the hands of busy 
mechanics; I see the smoke of the machine shops and foundries, where skill- 
ful artisans are constructing the marvelous productions of inventive genius; 
I see the clipper ships discharging their cargoes; drays are thundering over 
the pavements; the banks are open, and keen-sighted capitalists are on 
"Change"; and when I go to visit some little schoolroom, where a quiet 
woman is teaching reading and spelling, the school seems to be something 
distinct from the busy life outside. . . . 

But when I pause to remember that the steam engine was once but a dim 
idea in the brain of a boy; that intelligence is the motive power of trade and 
commerce; that the great city, with its banks and warehouses and princely 



POLITICAL AFFAIRS 195 

residences, has been built up by skilled labor; that in the construction and 
navigation of the ocean steamer so many of the principles of art and science 
must be applied — I see in the public school, with its busy brains, an engine 
mightier than one of steam; and the narrow aisles of the schoolroom broaden 
into the wide and thronged streets of the great city. I know that the school- 
boys will soon becoma workers; that one will command the steamship, and 
another will become the engineer; one will be a director of the Central Pacific 
Railroad, and another will ride over it to take his seat in the Senate of the 
United States; one will own the quartz mill, another will build the machinery, 
and still another will invent some improved method of working its ores; one 
will be the merchant who shall direct the channels of trade; one will be the 
president of the bank, and another shall frame laws for the protection of all 
these varied interests — and the teacher, whose occupation seemed so dis- 
connected from the progress of human affairs, becomes a worker on mind 
which shall hold the mastery over material things. 

Political Affairs 

At the meeting of the Republican Union Convention in 
June, 1867, my renomination was conceded to be certain, 
but, as events turned out, it was not secured without a 
sharp contest. The nomination for Governor hung in even 
scale between John Bidwell and George C. Gorham, and 
in order to obtain the votes needed to secure the nomination 
of Mr. Gorham, the political managers, in making up the 
" slate," agreed to give the nomination of state superin- 
tendent to a candidate who was backed by the members 
of the Methodist Church North. But my friends, aided 
by the personal efforts of Governor Low, succeeded in 
breaking the slate. Under the lead of Honorable Ira G. 
Hoitt, who was some years afterwards elected state 
superintendent, twenty-one members out of the sixty-three 
from San Francisco broke free from boss dictation and 
voted for me; other delegates from smaller counties refused 
to be traded; and on the first ballot I received the nomi- 
nation by a majority of forty votes. My speech to the 



196 MY FINAL BIENNIAL REPORT 

convention just before the ballot was taken, as reported 
by the stenographer, ran in part as follows: 

Mr. President and Gentlemen of the Union Convention: Five 
years ago, when the Union party of this state was organized, I stood upon 
this platform as the nominee of that party for the office of superintendent of 
public instruction, the only state officer to be elected at the coming election. 
I then pledged myself to devote every energy of mind and body and soul to 
the public-school interests of this state and to hold myself true to the prin- 
ciples of the Union party. I shall hold myself true to the pledges I made 
five years ago. I come here backed by no combination or delegation. I 
present myself as an educational candidate for this office. 

If you deem that the experience of five years is of any value in administer- 
ing the affairs of the department of public instruction, I ask the nomina- 
tion at your hands. If you think any other man more worthy of it, give it 
to him, and I shall rest satisfied and content. 

The nomination of George C. Gorham was regarded with 
disfavor by large numbers of Republicans who bolted the 
ticket and nominated an opposition candidate for governor. 
This action secured the election of Henry H. Haight, the 
Democratic nominee for governor, by a majority of eight 
thousand. The entire Republican ticket was also defeated, 
along with the candidate for governor. This result of the 
general election carried with it the defeat of the Republican 
nominees for judge of the supreme court and for state 
superintendent, at the special election one month later. 
The Democratic nominee for state superintendent was the 
Reverend O. P. Fitzgerald, of the Methodist Church South, 
who had been the nominee of the Breckenridge wing of the 
Democratic party in 1862. The educational and judicial 
campaign was one of great political and personal bitterness. 
Judge Curry was defeated by a majority of 3000 votes in 
favor of the Democratic nominee, and I lacked 1400 votes 
of an election. The personal efforts of teachers carried me 
1600 votes ahead of the judicial ticket. 



EDITORIAL VALEDICTORY 197 

The " California Teacher " 

For four years Mr. Swezey and myself had borne the 
burden of editing the California Teacher without compen- 
sation, except during the final year of our editorial life, 
when there was a surplus of receipts over expenditures of 
about $250, which we divided equally. In the December 
issue, 1867, I find my valedictory as editor, from which I 
quote a few paragraphs: 

My official connection with this department, and with the public schools 
of the state, closes with this month's issue of the California Teacher. I have 
been called upon to preside over the department of public instruction during 
the most trying period in the history of the nation, when the passions of men 
have been kept at fever-heat, and when the widely divergent extremes of 
popular feeling have admitted of neither compromise nor conciliation. It has 
been my endeavor during this period to keep the schools, as far as possible, 
free from partisan or sectarian control and influences. In the school law, 
drafted by my hands, there is no section which the bitterest partisan can 
truthfully characterize as "partisan, " "political" or "sectarian. " If speak- 
ing and acting for the Union during the war of secession was "partisan," 
then I plead guilty to the charge. ... In my official acts I have known 
neither political parties nor religious sects. No teachers can justly charge 
me with any official discrimination against them on account of political opin- 
ions or religious belief. . . . 

In my public acts and in my private life I have kept my character above 
reproach. I am willing to wait for the verdict of time to set me right. I 
am proud that, during my administration, a system of schools, free to all, 
has been organized; that teaching has been made a respectable occupation, 
partaking of the character of a profession, and that teachers have been paid 
something like reasonable wages. The work cannot be undone. The state 
will not go back of its progressive record. 



CHAPTER XII 

PRINCIPAL OF THE DENMAN GRAMMAR SCHOOL AND 
DEPUTY SUPERINTENDENT OF SCHOOLS 

At the election in 1867, which proved so disastrous to 
the Republican party, Mr. James Denman, who at that 
time was the popular principal of the Denman Grammar 
School, was elected on the Democratic ticket to the office 
of city superintendent of schools in San Francisco. For- 
tunately I secured an appointment to the place made 
vacant by his election. The intense partisanship which 
had prevailed during the Civil War still existed to some 
extent, and the Democratic board of education hesitated 
about giving an important position to a defeated candi- 
date of the Republican party. But many influential 
citizens urged my appointment, and thereby placed me 
under lifelong obligation for their earnest efforts in my 
behalf. At this time I was desperately in need of a 
position. By an unfortunate partnership investment in 
Sonoma vineyard land, all the careful savings of my life 
up to that time had been swept away, and financially I 
started anew without a dollar after my debts were paid, 
and with a wife and child to support. 

The teachers in the Denman School received me with a 
warm welcome, and I cheerfully entered on my schoolroom 
duties. This school was in all respects a pleasant one. 
Under the school regulations at that time the principal 
was required to teach the highest grade class for two hours 
daily, taking entire charge of the class in arithmetic and 

198 



AN ENLARGED HORIZON 1 99 

grammar, which were considered the essential studies. The 
remainder of the principal's time was given to the general 
management of the school and the inspection of the lower- 
grade classes of assistant teachers. After five years of 
strenuous work in the state department of public instruc- 
tion, my work in a grammar school for girls seemed like 
playing kindergarten. I now began a careful study of 
methods in teaching, by simplifying the instruction of the 
lower grades in arithmetic and by arranging work suited 
to the age and capacity of the pupils. For a time I took 
entire charge of written language lessons in the lower 
grades, and composition writing in the higher grades. 

During the nine years that I had been principal of the 
Rincon School, the regulations had required principals to 
take entire charge of instruction in the highest-grade class, 
thus leaving them no time whatever for visiting other 
classes. But in the Denman School -there was ample time 
for supervision and experimental work, as I was required 
by the regulations to teach a class only two hours a day. 
The school numbered seven hundred girls, divided into 
fourteen classes. My five years' work in the state office 
had enlarged my educational horizon. During that time I 
had made a study of city and state school reports, of school 
journals, and of the latest books on education. This ex- 
tensive reading, combined with executive work, constituted 
an effective supplement to my previous academic and nor- 
mal-school education, and though it never made up my loss 
of a college course, it helped to give me a fair equipment for 
my work as an educator. 

On the nth day of July, 1868, there was born into our 
family a son, whom we named William Russell Swett, after 
my revered teacher and friend, Professor William Russell. 



200 THE DENMAN GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

He was a child of great promise, but when he was four 
months old a careless servant left open a window of his 
room on one rainy day, and he took a cold which ended in 
pneumonia. In a few days he passed away, though we 
did not consider him dangerously sick. Years afterwards 
a nurse that we employed confessed that she had thrown 
into the fire the medicine which our family physician had 
prescribed during her watch for a part of the night, and had 
then given to the child one of her own nostrums. We could 
not endure to live longer in the rented house in which our 
child died, and therefore bought a house on the installment 
plan, making a payment of $90 a month to the bank that 
held the mortgage. These monthly payments were made 
without default for a period of five years, ending in March, 
1874. The burden was a heavy one, but with economy, 
prudence, and the wise home management of my wife, we 
carried it to the end, and appreciated our home the higher 
on account of the self-denial it had cost. My wife's mother 
had made her home with us for many years, and my own 
mother, after the death of her second husband, came to 
California and made her home with us. Notwithstanding 
my wife and myself each had a mother and a mother-in- 
law in the family, we lived in peace and harmony. At 
our home, 141 9 Taylor Street, there was born, on Novem- 
ber 22, 1869, our second son, Frank Tracy Swett, who 
grew through childhood under the watchful care of his 
mother and two grandmothers. 

The Building up of the Lincoln Evening School 

In 1868 I was elected as teacher of an evening school in 
the Lincoln building. In seeking this appointment I had 
a double purpose. One object was to eke out my salary 



THE LINCOLN EVENING SCHOOL 201 

of $1800 a year in the Denman School by the fifty dollars 
a month allowed for an evening school-teacher; the other 
was to build up a system of evening schools such as I 
thought the city needed. As early as 1856 Mr. Denman 
and myself had volunteered our services, without pay, if 
the board of education would open a city evening school. 
Accordingly, the school began in the basement rooms of 
St. Mary's Cathedral on California Street. At the end 
of a month we retired, and the board of education elected 
and paid three regular teachers. These classes dragged 
along for ten years without any marked increase. 

The opening of my class was made known by a leading 
editorial in one of the daily papers and by a local paragraph 
in each of the other papers. As a result, on the first evening 
my classroom was crowded with more than a hundred 
pupils. Next day I asked the chairman of the committee 
on evening schools to assign me an assistant. In less than 
a month there were five classes, and before the end of the 
term there were eight classes, with a total of four hundred 
pupils. Then I was made principal and was relieved from 
teaching a class. Large numbers of young men over eight- 
een years of age flocked into the school, but under the reg- 
ulations of the board of education a tuition fee of one dollar 
a month was required of such pupils. As I looked at them 
week after week, I had not the heart to collect this money. 
After three months had drifted away, Mr. John F. Meagher, 
chairman of the committee on evening schools, called at the 
school and asked me if I was collecting the tuition fee from 
the men over eighteen years of age. I replied, "No, Mr. 
Meagher, I am not, and I would rather resign my position 
than do so. Why, look at these men, Mr. Meagher; more 
than half of them came from Ireland, like yourself. They 



202 THE DENMAN GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

are working hard to earn a living and get on in the world. 
It is petty business for the city of San Francisco to collect 
from them a tuition fee of a dollar a month. Why not 
admit them free?" Like the warm-hearted Irishman that 
he was, he said at once: "You are right, Mr. Swett. Let 
them in free and say nothing more about it." And thus 
we two, Catholic and Puritan standing together, killed the 
rate bill in the evening schools. John F. Meagher passed 
away many years ago, but his name ought to be placed 
high on the roll of honor among the men who helped to 
build up the evening schools. In this connection I call to 
mind an incident that occurred soon after. 

For several evenings I had noticed a man of middle age 
loitering on the sidewalk in front of the school building. 
When I asked him what he wanted he replied: " I want to 
learn to read. I was born in the backwoods and never had 
a chance to go to school. I have been hanging around here 
for a week, without daring to go in for fear the boys would 
laugh at me." I told him I would take care of that if he 
would come to school two days later. A new thought 
struck me. I gave notice through an item in each of the 
city papers that a class would be opened in the Lincoln 
building composed exclusively of adults who wished to learn 
to read. In a week there was a class of thirty men, and two 
weeks later another class was formed. Next I started a 
class in bookkeeping and assigned to it Joseph O'Connor, 
who had just come over from Ireland. His measure I 
took at once. I said to him: " There is the class. The 
pupils are of all sizes and all ages. Teach them as best 
you can in your own way." He managed his class so well 
that he was soon made vice-principal of a grammar school, 
and then principal. He became deputy superintendent 



WORK OF THE EVENING SCHOOL 203 

under Superintendent Moulder, and finally principal of the 
Mission High School. 

Next, William A. Robertson, a genial veteran of the 
Confederate army just arrived from Georgia, was sent to 
me as teacher of a new class. He managed his unruly boys 
as bravely as he had fought in Lee's army at Gettysburg. 
He was one of the hardest workers I ever knew, and his sense 
of humor made him a general favorite. We became the 
firmest of friends. He was soon promoted to one of the 
day schools, and finally was elected principal of the Hamil- 
ton Grammar School, in which position he remained until 
he answered to the roll-call of death, a few years ago. 
Then John C. Pel ton, a pioneer teacher, stranded in fortune 
and broken in spirit, found a temporary place as teacher of 
a class. At a later period H. C. Kinne, a veteran teacher 
of country schools, drifted into the Lincoln Evening School, 
where he has remained for more than twenty years, doing 
missionary work among the men and boys that flock into 
his classroom. 

A few months later a class in architectural drawing was 
opened, the board at my request giving the use of the 
room and the teacher charging a tuition fee of one dollar 
a month. In a short time this class was made free. Mean- 
while the classes in the school were roughly graded by 
transferring pupils from one class to another. At the end 
of two years there were twelve evening classes in the 
Lincoln building, every suitable room being filled. The 
success of this evening school was owing to the fact that 
the discipline was strict, the classes were graded in a rough 
way, and tuition was free to adults. Every two weeks the 
older pupils were gathered in the large hall and addressed 
by members of the board, or other citizens interested in the 



204 THE DENMAN GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

school, and the proceedings reported in the papers. I 
appealed to the adult members of the classes to become my 
assistants in maintaining discipline among the boys. I 
remained principal of the school for three years and then 
resigned in consequence of being appointed deputy city 
superintendent of schools. As I look back upon my man- 
agement of this school it seems to me to be one of my best 
pieces of educational work. 

After I left the school it fell into the hands of Joseph 
O'Connor and was developed into a system of evening 
schools excelled by no other city in the United States. 
These schools have now become an integral part of the 
public-school system, continued for the same length of 
time as the day schools. The teachers are paid a salary 
of six hundred dollars a year and are permanent in 
their positions. The schools include commercial classes 
and high-school classes, in addition to the grammar 
grades. 

As a striking illustration of the far-reaching influence 
of these evening schools, I mention one little incident. 
One day in 1895, as I was walking down Market Street, I 
met Judge Hunt, one of the most upright and most popular 
of Superior Court judges in the city, who has been repeat- 
edly elected and reelected regardless of political parties. 
He hailed me with, "Swett, do you know when I first saw 
you?" 

"I hope it wasn't in your court as a criminal on trial," 
was my bantering reply. 

"Do you remember, Mr. Swett, the evening school class 
of which you were the , teacher in 1856, forty years ago? 
Well, I was a member of that class when I was a hard- 
working boy during the daytime. I owe my education to 



AN OLD RULE ABOLISHED 205 

the start I got there. I have never forgotten what I owe 
to you and the evening school." 

As a matter of comparative value, Judge Hunt has been 
worth more to the city of San Francisco than the cost of 
the whole system of evening schools for half a century. 

An Old Rule is Abolished 

In a previous chapter I alluded to the annual reexamina- 
tion of teachers which was required by boards of education 
during the first decade of the educational history of San 
Francisco. From 1851 to 1869 it had been the custom of 
boards of education to go into secret executive session at 
the end of each year, declare all positions of teachers vacant, 
and then proceed to elect teachers "for one year only." 
Not unfrequently good teachers were dropped out to make 
room for friends of new members of the board or for other 
teachers backed by powerful influences. When teachers so 
removed appealed to members of the board, the reply was, 
"There was nothing against you, only you did not get 
enough votes to elect you." One day in 1869 it occurred 
to me that it was time for somebody to make a protest 
against such "Star-chamber" proceedings. I went to the 
president of the board, stated the facts in the case, and 
secured a pledge of his support in electing teachers "during 
good behavior" instead of for one year, so that they might 
feel some reasonable security in their positions as long as 
their teaching was satisfactory. Joseph O'Connor, then a 
grammar-school principal, backed me in this effort, and 
John F. Meagher, member of the board of education, joined 
hands with both of us in this reform. We canvassed the 
board, but when the matter was brought up it failed to 
carry. We then invoked the aid of the press, and after a 



206 THE DENMAN GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

contest of six months, finally secured the desired reform. 
Of course, incompetent teachers could be dropped at any 
time, but most of the teachers remained reasonably secure. 
This action of the board was the first step towards the 
" teachers' tenure of office" law for San Francisco, secured 
by act of the legislature a few years later, for which teachers 
were largely indebted to Ira G. Hoitt, then a member of 
the assembly from San Francisco. Mr. Hoitt several 
years later was elected state superintendent of public 
instruction. 

During the June vacation of 1869 I took advantage of 
the completion of the Central Pacific Railroad to make a 
four weeks' visit to New England. My stepfather, William 
Berry, had been bedridden for three years, afiiicted with 
the worst type of inflammatory rheumatism, from which 
he suffered untold torments. My mother, worn with care 
and watching, had long been urging me to come home to 
see her. My stepfather died soon after my return to 
California, and in 1870 I went East with a teachers' excur- 
sion party, and brought my mother to California, where 
she lived in our family for twenty-six years. 

Appointed Deputy Superintendent 

At the autumn city election in 1869, Mr. J. H. Widber, a 
former member of the board of education, was elected city 
superintendent of schools on the " People's Party" ticket. 

I accepted an appointment as deputy superintendent, on 
condition that the board of education should fix the salary 
at three thousand a year. I disliked to give up the Den- 
man School, but a higher salary turned the scale in favor 
of acceptance, though the tenure of office was short and 
uncertain. 



DEPUTY SUPERINTENDENT OF SCHOOLS 207 

As Superintendent Widber had never been a teacher, he 
attended to business official duties and turned over some of 
the strictly educational details to me. I was occupied for 
two months in making a thorough and complete revision of 
the rules and regulations of the school department. I 
reduced these rules to plain English by cutting out a great 
deal of verbiage and rubbish. Then I was mainly occupied 
for some time with a revision of the course of study, which 
had become crowded with a mass of odds and ends that 
made it exceedingly cumbersome. The pruning knife was 
mercilessly applied. • As usual, the conservatives set up 
complaints about " radical changes," but the teachers be- 
came satisfied when the course was fully understood. 

The appointment of teachers had been for a long time a 
matter of personal patronage equally divided among the 
members of the board of education. Neither the superin- 
tendent nor his deputy had anything whatever to do with 
this reserved right of the school directors. The possession 
of a certificate constituted the only evidence of fitness to 
teach that was required by the board, and the nomination 
of a teacher by one school director was confirmed by the 
vote of all the others, with true senatorial courtesy. 

In looking over my annual reports to the superintendent 
for the years 1872 and 1873, I nn d little worthy of note. 
These reports were mainly filled up with statistics and with 
sets of questions used in quarterly and annual written 
examinations. The preparation of such questions involved 
a great waste of time by the deputy superintendent, and 
still greater waste of time by pupils in writing the answers 
and by teachers in examining and crediting the papers. 
At that time all the city schools of the United States were 
running wild on the subject of written examinations. My 



208 THE DENMAN GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

protests were of no avail. The system was too strong to 
be broken up. I did succeed, however, in securing an 
order of the board of education authorizing an oral exami- 
nation of each and every grammar-grade class in the school 
department. As it was utterly impossible for the deputy 
superintendent, alone, to conduct this examination, in 
addition to visiting the primary schools and doing his office 
work, Joseph Leggett, an experienced teacher and skillful 
examiner, was temporarily employed for three months as 
an examiner. From half a day to a day was devoted to the 
examinations of each class. Detailed reports in writing 
were made to the committee concerning the standing of 
each class in the more important studies, the general order 
and discipline of the class, and the apparent merits of the 
teacher. 

During the months of April and May my own time was 
occupied in preparing the questions for the annual written 
examination. The time of Mr. Leggett was given to an 
oral examination of various classes in the two high schools, 
and to the preparation of full sets of questions for the 
annual written examination in those schools. In order to 
complete the oral examination of the grammar grades it 
was found necessary to employ an additional examiner for 
a month and a half, and H. P. Carlton was appointed 
for that purpose. The information thus obtained was so 
valuable, and the results were so satisfactory, that in June, 
at the close of the school year, Mr. Leggett was elected as 
a regular examining teacher at large. These oral examina- 
tions had a marked effect in encouraging both teachers and 
pupils. A good oral examiner is a traveling normal-school 
instructor, suggesting methods of teaching, and his salary 
is a trifling expense compared with the substantial educa- 



WILLIAM SWINTON 209 

tional benefits resulting from his services in the school 
department. 

William Swinton 

I first met Professor William Swinton soon after he had 
been elected (1871) to the chair of History and English 
Literature in the new State University of California, then 
holding its sessions in the city of Oakland. Mr. Swinton 
had won a high literary reputation as a war correspondent of 
the New York Times, and as author of an historical volume 
on the " Campaigns of'the Army of the Potomac." When I 
met him he was engaged in writing his " Condensed History 
of the United States" for use in grammar schools, and he 
showed me some of the proof sheets. After this book was 
brought out I suggested to him that it ought to be accom- 
panied by a primary history for the lower grades. He 
accordingly wrote a delightful story of our country, which 
was received with great favor. Shortly after, "Swin ton's 
Word Analysis" appeared. His publishers then requested 
him to prepare a book introductory to word analysis which 
should be mainly a spelling book. Professor Swinton asked 
me to make a beginning of this book, remarking that he 
knew very little about teaching spelling, and that he would 
pay me whatever the work was worth. 

I thought the matter over, made a beginning of twenty 
pages and submitted it to him, at the same time suggesting 
a plan for the remainder of the book. He then insisted 
that I should go on with the book to completion, and said 
that he would revise it if necessary. Accordingly, my leisure 
hours for a full year were given to this work, which Mr. 
Swinton took on to New York, where he passed his' summer 
vacation. The only material change he made in the original 



2IO THE DENMAN GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

manuscript was in cutting out a few lessons in spelling 
and substituting short lessons in denning. This book, 
entitled "Swin ton's Word Book of Written and Oral 
Spelling," proved a success from the beginning. As Swinton 
had no money to pay for my work, he generously gave me 
a half interest in the copyright. A year or two later I 
wrote for him a book for primary grades, called "Swinton's 
Word Primer," which was published exactly as I prepared 
it. These two books, with "Swinton's Word Analysis," in 
which I had no hand, made up what was known as "Swin- 
ton's Word Book Series." This series, after an interval of 
a quarter of a century, is still in extensive use. 

A year or two later, Harper and Brothers published 
" S win ton's Progressive Grammar " to which I contributed 
some exercises in composition work. This book was too has- 
tily written to be of any permanent value. It was soon fol- 
lowed, however, by " Swinton's Language Lessons," which 
Mr. Swinton began at my suggestion. For two or three 
years I had urged on him the desirability of combining 
composition exercises with the principles of grammar, and 
he finally became convinced of the possibility of doing so. 
I furnished Mr. Swinton with the practical language exer- 
cises taken from actual work done in the Denman Grammar 
School, of which I was principal. The writing of the book 
was done entirely by Mr. Swinton, and I had no financial 
interest in it whatever, my contribution of plan and prac- 
tical exercises being given as a labor of love. This book 
had an unprecedented run of popularity. It broke the 
long reign of Lindley Murray's method of teaching ele- 
mentary grammar. Mr. Swinton next prepared for Ivison, 
Blakeman, Taylor and Company a two-book geography 
series — a comprehensive geography for the higher gram- 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION 211 

mar grades and an elementary book for beginners. On 
these two books I was a collaborator, at times, for two 
years. This series included some excellent features, but 
the "Comprehensive" was too large, and neither of the 
books went into extensive use. In 1875 Professor Swinton 
asked a leave of absence for the purpose of bringing out 
his geography, but the board of regents declined to give it, 
and he resigned his position and moved to New York City. 
After this I met him but once, and then only for a day, 
though I afterwards did some geographical work for him. 
He was a rapid writer, who could toil at his desk twelve 
hours a day when in the mood for hard work. He had a 
happy way of putting things in clear and attractive form, 
and was quick to receive suggestions from teachers. 

Meeting of the National Educational Association, 

Boston, 1872 

On the 20th of July, 187 1, there was born into our family 
a promising child that we named Walter Harper Swett. 
He was a very winning child and we loved him with pas- 
sionate devotion. When eleven months old he had a hard 
time in teething. Our family physician being away, we 
called in a doctor who knew very little about treating a 
sick child. For a long and weary month every hour of the 
day that I could spare from my official duty, and every 
hour that I could snatch from sleep at night, was passed 
in watching over him. For thirty days and thirty nights 
of alternating hope and despair, as the disease ebbed and 
flowed, I saw the little life so dear to us drifting slowly and 
helplessly away from us. He died on the first anniversary 
of his birthday, and left on us the shadow of the deepest 
grief we had ever known. 



212 THE DENMAN GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

Some months before our bereavement I had received and 
accepted an invitation from Dr. Emerson E. White, presi- 
dent of the National Educational Association, to read a 
paper at the Boston meeting on the examination and 
certification of teachers. I had only begun the outline of 
my address at the time my child became dangerously 
ill, and after his death I was so utterly prostrated that I 
felt unable to write. But my noble-hearted wife, herself 
prostrated by our loss, insisted on my going, saying that I 
needed an entire change of surroundings. So I started on 
my trip to the East and jotted down my address on the 
way. My traveling companion was William Swinton, at 
that time professor of History and Rhetoric in the State 
University of California. 

The meeting of the National Educational Association 
at Boston, August, 1872, was a small one, the registered 
attendance being only 292 members. President White's 
address was able; Newton Bateman's was eloquent ; the 
Reverend A. D. Mayo's paper on " Methods of Moral In- 
struction in the Common Schools " was full of enlightened 
common sense; and William T. Harris, of St. Louis, was 
a leader in discussions. The city authorities gave an in- 
formal evening reception to members in Faneuil Hall. 
Among the educators whom I met, I recall the names of 
Henry Barnard, S. S. Greene, Bronson Alcott, Elizabeth 
Peabody, John Hancock, C. C. Rounds, General John 
Eaton, B. F. Tweed, Wm. F. Phelps, J. P. Wickersham, 
and B. G. Northrop. My address at the general session 
created a ripple of interest because it was the voice of an 
outside barbarian, from the wilderness of California, calling 
for reform. It was, in fact, the earliest formal protest 
made in the United States by a public school-teacher 



ADDRESS AT BOSTON 213 

before an organized body of teachers, against the existing 
manner of examining and certifying teachers and in favor 
of some kind of educational civil service. 

It was thirty-eight years ago that I wrote this address, and 
now, as I run over the printed pages, I am surprised at my 
audacity, before an audience assembled at the hub of New 
England conservatism, in delivering an address made up 
of a mixture of historical facts, bantering humor, sarcasm, 
and righteous indignation. But I am not ready to take 
back a word of it. Within the last decade there has been 
a great quickening of professional spirit, but there still 
remains a pressing need of further reform. Therefore I 
proceed to reiterate educational heresy by quoting some 
paragraphs from my Boston address. 

It may reasonably be expected, when a man accepts an invitation to pre- 
pare a paper for this association, and travels three thousands miles to read 
it, paying full fare each way, that he will condense his thoughts into the 
fewest possible words. The subject assigned to me is one that I have had 
to deal with for many years, and concerning it I have definite and decided 
opinions. For eight years I was principal of a grammar school in San 
Francisco, and — I am ashamed to own it, and would not tell it were it not 
necessary to illustrate what I intend to present — I had the cowardice, like 
other teachers with me, to submit, without protest, to eight annual reexam- 
inations to secure a certificate "valid for one year," in order to determine 
my fitness to teach the same school for each succeeding school year. Nor 
was this the end of humiliation and insult. After getting a "brand-new" 
certificate at the end of each year, before I could enter school again I had to 
be reelected by the votes of the members of the city board of education, 
because my term of office was limited by law to one year. . . . 

This annual reelection of teachers was handed down to us from the prim- 
itive New England town meeting. Right here in Boston, in most New Eng- 
land cities, villages, and towns, and in most other parts of our country, this 
system is still kept up by law or by custom. A teacher holds his office for 
only one year, and then he is at the mercy of the whim of any school trustee, 
school director, or prudential committeeman that may have some spite to 
wreak or some relative to put into school. Much as I honor the profession 



214 THE DENMAN GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

of teaching, I am not in love with a legal system that tends to take all the 
manliness out of a man and all independence from a woman. . . . 

Finally, when after eight years of continuous service in one school I was 
forced into a long and difficult written examination before I had fairly recov- 
ered from a typhoid fever that brought me to the verge of the grave, I made 
a vow to break up and root out the annual reexamination farce and the 
annual reelection tradition. I secured a nomination and an election to the 
only office then open to a teacher, that of state superintendent of public 
instruction. My official position enabled me to revise the state school law 
and secure needed reforms. During five years of strenuous effort I lobbied 
state legislatures, secured a state tax for the partial support of free schools; 
secured life diplomas for professional teachers and the renewal of the short- 
term certificates of lower grade without reexamination; placed the exami- 
nation of teachers exclusively in the hands of experienced teachers; gained 
a legal recognition of the normal school diplomas of other states, as well as 
a recognition of the life or permanent certificates of other states; and 
ridiculed out of existence the annual reelection of experienced teachers in 
San Francisco. 

You will now understand why I entertain strong convictions on the man- 
ner of examining and certificating teachers. My educational views have 
changed somewhat since I taught school near the city of Boston. New con- 
ditions have brought new issues. While I fully recognize how much the 
American public schools owe to the early common schools of New England, 
I take satisfaction in hurling a few educational brickbats against certain laws, 
usages, and customs that stand opposed to progress. . . . 

One weak point in our school system is found in the short terms of office 
for school trustees and members of city boards of education. Annual elec- 
tions were suited to the primitive New England towns and school districts, 
but when applied to large cities and to the vast expanse of Western states, 
they have proved demoralizing in results. When one set of officials succeeds 
another as often as the seasons change, there can be no systematic improve- 
ment. Each new set of officials is mainly bent on "reforming" the work of 
its predecessors. In many parts of our country, boards of education elected 
by one political party feel under no obligation to retain in place the teachers 
elected by the opposite party. There has been a great deal of talk about 
reform in civil-service appointments, but the country stands in greater need 
of reform in the manner of making educational appointments. . . . 

If the teachers of New England are willing to submit to this condition of 
things, let them fold their arms with all due meekness, leaving the work of 
reform to the outside barbarians of the West. But until there is a reform in 
these two weak points of our school system, it seems to me there can be no 



ADDRESS AT BOSTON 215 

marked and permanent improvement in our public schools as a whole. 
There will be individual schools that, under superior teachers, will attain a 
high degree of excellence; but the general average of the schools cannot be 
raised much higher than it is, because the system neither encourages inde- 
pendent thought nor tolerates progress. . . . 

In addition to a state board of examination empowered to issue life 
diplomas on examination, or on certain specified credentials from normal 
schools or universities, it is desirable that there should be an efficient system 
of county or city boards of examination authorized by law to issue local 
certificates. These boards should be mainly composed of professional 
teachers. Thus, by combining state, city, and town examinations, together 
with interstate recognition of professional certificates, something might be 
done to raise the standard of professional teaching. 

It may be urged against any plan of competitive examinations that 
"percentages" represent only scholarship, but fail to gauge the power to 
discipline, the tact to manage, and the skill to teach. This may be. true to 
some extent; but it is also true that there is a fair standard of scholarly 
attainment below which no men or women should be allowed to make a trial 
of teaching. 

It is often urged that a college diploma ought to be taken as a valid cer- 
tificate. It was so taken in former times, and is so taken now in many places. 
But a college-bred young man may or may not be qualified to teach a common 
school. I have known many young men coming to California with flying 
colors and fresh diplomas, who failed to secure a certificate to teach even the 
lowest grade school, on an examination in reading, spelling, arithmetic, gram- 
mar, geography, and the history of the United States, so elementary in 
character that, to a pupil of average attainments in the highest grade of an 
ordinary grammar school, it would have been merely play. They exhibited 
a most lamentable ignorance of the very elements required to be taught in 
every common school. They might have been brilliant in the dead lan- 
guages, but they misspelled and mispronounced their mother tongue, and 
could not cipher accurately. ... 

In conclusion, I submit the following propositions for the consideration of 
teachers, educators, and legislators: 

(a) A comprehensive system of state, city and county boards of ex- 
amination which shall be composed mainly of professional teachers and 
educators. 

(b) A graded series of teachers' certificates ranging from life diplomas 
to temporary certificates. 

(c) Interstate recognition of teachers' certificates and normal school 
diplomas. 



2l6 THE DENMAN GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

(d) Longer terms of office for state, city, and county superintendents 
and for school trustees and members of city boards of education. 

(e) A war of independence to be waged against the formal annual reelec- 
tion of teachers. 

My somewhat caustic attack on the annual reexamina- 
tion of teachers and their reelection for the term of one 
year attracted no special attention at the time, so far as I 
knew, but ten or twelve years later Mr. Carrigan, a lawyer 
from Boston, called on me in San Francisco and told me that 
he heard my Boston address, and that it made a deep im- 
pression on him. He said that he was at that time a law 
student in the law office of Benjamin F. Butler, and was 
also principal of an evening school in Boston. He at once^ 
set about securing an amendment to the Massachusetts 
state law which limited the teachers' tenure of office to 
one year. He put his bill before the state legislature for 
five years in succession, and finally secured a provision 
making it optional with city boards of education to elect 
teachers for a term of four years. I never saw Mr. Carrigan 
again, for on his way home he died in a Pullman sleeping 
car, probably from suffocation, though he was reported as 
having "died from apoplexy." 

In 1877, five years after the Boston meeting, I attempted 
to stir up Eastern educators by a series of articles in the 
New England Journal of Education, of which I was the 
contributing editor for the Pacific Coast at the time when 
Thomas W. Bicknell was the manager and the Reverend 
A. D. Mayo was the leading editorial writer. By referring 
to a voluminous scrapbook, I find that in the issue of the 
Journal, March 1, 1877, there is a leading article, bearing 
my signature, on " Professional Certificates for Teachers," 
from which I quote a paragraph as follows; 



ADRIFT ONCE MORE 217 

There is a small army of teachers moving slowly westward across the con- 
tinent; is it essential to the common school system that each teacher when he 
crosses a state line must halt to be examined to see if he is "fit to teach a 
common school for one year?" Is it necessary to the perpetuity of free in- 
stitutions to keep up a system of passports worse than European ? Is there 
no relief for teachers from annual reexaminations and annual reelections 
but in the grave ? The legislatures of some of the states are now in session. 
One single educator of nerve can move a whole legislature if he knows where 
to look for its brains. 

This was followed up by other articles, such as "The Art 
of Teaching;" "The Profession of Teaching;" "The Science 
of Teaching;" "The Next Step;" "Things Essential;" 
"Ungraded Schools," etc. 1 

After my short vacation of six weeks was over, I re- 
sumed my duties as deputy superintendent of schools in 
San Francisco for another year, at the end of which time, 
by a turn in the wheel of politics, I found myself adrift once 
more. 

In 1873 Superintendent Widber was renominated by the 
Republican party, and James Denman became the nominee 
of the Democratic party. In the campaign that followed, 
an act of the legislature of 1872-73 was brought to light, 
which provided that a person to be eligible for the office 
of city or county superintendent must be a professional 

1 As a kind of supplement to all the preceding professional talk, I take 
great delight in stating that in 1902 the state of Massachusetts made by 
law a provision for the granting of state certificates by the state board of 
education. I have recently learned that a few of the leading educators and 
teachers of my native state have just held a meeting at Concord, the capi- 
tal, to take measures to secure, at the coming session of the legislature, a law 
similar to that of Massachusetts. I rejoice greatly, and stretch out across 
the continent the right hand of glad fellowship to those twentieth-century 
teachers in New Hampshire. At the same time I am reluctantly compelled 
to admit that in all parts of California, except San Francisco, which has a 
special tenure-of-office law, school trustees are prohibited by law from elect- 
ing teachers for a term exceeding one year. 



2l8 THE DENMAN GRAMMAR SCHOOL 

teacher and the holder of a teacher's certificate. It was 
therefore contended that Mr. Widber would be ineligible 
if elected. The law was clearly unconstitutional and was 
soon repealed, but it proved to be the main cause of Mr. 
Widber's defeat. 

As it was not in accordance with the unwritten code of 
political ethics that a Democratic superintendent should 
continue a Republican deputy in position, I retired from 
office, and was succeeded by my personal friend, Joseph 
Leggett, who had been a coworker with me in conducting 
oral examinations of the city schools. No better appoint- 
ment could frave been made, for Mr. Leggett combined 
democracy with enlightened common sense, energy, and 
scholarship. At a succeeding election Mr. Leggett was 
elected as a member of the board of education, in which 
position he served with credit to himself and with benefit 
to the schools. 

As for myself, I was elected principal of the Denman 
School, to which I returned with delight. The position of 
deputy had not proved a bed of roses. The endless prepa- 
ration of sets of questions for written examinations, in 
which I had little faith, had grown distasteful to me, and 
I welcomed the pleasanter work of teaching. In this school 
I found ample time for reading and study, and I made good 
use of it. There was also an opportunity to make experi- 
ments in methods of teaching in both primary and grammar 
grades. I was entirely content with my position, and ex- 
pected to remain in it until disabled by old age or turned 
out by some change in the political make-up of the board of 
education. 

In May, 1876, Ellis H. Holmes, after a long and suc- 
cessful career as principal of the Girls' High School, 



PROMOTION . 219 

found himself able to retire from school and live upon his 
income. Accordingly, he sent in his resignation. Super- 
intendent Denman, after an able administration of two 
years, was renominated on the Democratic ticket, but was 
defeated by the Republican nominee, Henry N. Bolander. 
Several of my personal friends on the board of education 
desired my promotion to the high school, and several of 
Mr. Denman's friends wished to return him to the Denman 
School. Rather reluctantly I consented to the arrange- 
ment, with the condition that a post-graduate course of 
one year should be added to the regular high-school three 
years' course, for the double purpose of fitting graduates to 
enter the recently established State University of California 
or to become elementary teachers. 



CHAPTER XIII 

PRINCIPAL OF THE GIRLS' HIGH SCHOOL AND NORMAL 
CLASS OF SAN FRANCISCO 

The Girls' High School, at the time I took charge of it 
in July, 1876, numbered about four hundred pupils in 
charge of twelve regular teachers, with a course of study 
limited, like other high schools in California at that time, to 
three years. From the time of its establishment in 1864 it 
had remained exclusively an English high school except 
for two years. 

In 1871-72, when I was deputy superintendent, on my 
recommendation the board of education adopted the 
following rule: "Whenever there shall be a sufficient 
number of pupils desiring instruction in the ancient 
languages to form a class of at least fifteen pupils, a classical 
course shall be established in the Girls' High School for 
the purpose of fitting students to enter the college of 
letters in the University of California." Under this rule 
a small class maintained a lingering existence for two 
years, when the discouraged teacher of Latin and Greek 
resigned and the class was discontinued. 

In 1876 George Tait was a leading member of the city 
board of education. He had formerly been a grammar- 
school principal, then city superintendent of schools for 
four years, next for two years principal of the State Normal 
School in San Francisco previous to its removal to San Jose. 
It was through his influence in the San Francisco board of 
education that I secured an indirect extension of the course 
of study in the Girls' High School to four years instead of 

the previous limitation of three years. 

220 



GEORGE W. MINNS 221 

The resolution adopted by the board provided for the 
establishment of a post-graduate class to consist of high- 
school graduates who wished to fit for admission to the 
University of California, with a normal department for 
graduates that wished to fit themselves for teaching in 
elementary schools. 

There were found forty graduates who desired to become 
teachers, but not a single one who desired to enter the 
university. Consequently only the normal class was 
organized. Mrs. Mary W. Kincaid, then head assistant in 
the South Cosmopolitan Grammar School, was appointed 
teacher of this class. Educated in a young ladies' semi- 
nary, she was herself without normal training, but she 
soon developed into a superior teacher. 

What time I could spare from my regular high-school 
duties was given to instruction in methods of teaching. 
In the course of a few years the number of applicants for 
admission increased to a hundred, and Professor George W. 
Minns' was invited from Boston to act as an assistant. 
Mr. Minns was one of the earlier teachers in the English 
High School for boys and girls in San Francisco (1856) and 
was afterwards for several years principal of the first State 
Normal School during a part of the time that the school 
was located in San Francisco. He was a graduate of Har- 
vard University and a man of rare scholarship. 

A teacher of German was elected to the high school in 
1877, and as he was employed only a part of his time, I 
was allowed by the board to organize a class in Latin under 
his instruction. There were no pupils who desired to take 
Greek. In most respects the course otherwise continued 
in the line of the traditions of the school, — an English 
high school. 



2 22 THE GIRLS' HIGH SCHOOL 

The course of study was not all that could be desired, but 
it had some good features, and in the main was adapted to 
the needs of the pupils; for the high school is essentially 
an outgrowth of the grammar school. Its course of study 
and its mental status are largely determined by the training 
given in the lower departments of the school system. At 
that time the fact that more than one half of all the pupils 
who entered the Girls' High School intended to become 
teachers was also to be taken into consideration in the 
curriculum. 

Without going into details, the leading purpose of the 
school was to graduate girls with the ability to read and 
spell well; a fair knowledge of English grammar; some 
knowledge of the meaning and use of words, of etymology 
and of synonyms; a fair knowledge of algebra and geometry; 
some knowledge of physical and political geography; a 
general outline of the history of the world; some knowledge 
of what to read in English literature, and how to read it; 
the ability to express their thoughts in correct English, 
gained by actual practice in composition, rather than by 
study of technical textbooks on rhetoric; an elementary 
knowledge of physics, botany, and zoology; some knowledge 
of physiology and of the laws of health; some training in 
vocal culture and vocal music; a course, for those who 
desired it, of Latin, French, or German. 

The main purpose of the school was, not to fit young 
women for the State University, but to give them a sub- 
stantial general secondary education. Yet the school 
afforded the means of fitting for the university if students 
desired to go there. The average number from the school 
wh j entered the university was three or four a year, or 
less than two per cent of the graduates. It was found 



GROWTH OF THE SCHOOL 223 

impossible to secure enough pupils to make up a "univer- 
sity class," not because the girls were not encouraged to 
enter such a class, but because few parents were financially 
able to send their girls through the university. 

I soon found that my ideal of a high school with a normal 
department could not be realized, but I did what I could 
under existing conditions. Under any financial stringency 
the high schools were the first to suffer. From time to 
time special teachers of music, drawing, French, German, 
and Latin were dismissed as a measure of economy. 

As the school increased in numbers, the classes were 
crowded up to fifty pupils to a teacher. When the normal 
class increased to eighty pupils, it was found impossible 
to crowd them into a room containing only fifty-six desks. 
But there was only one room available in the school build- 
ing, and we were compelled to divide the class into two 
sections of forty each, one section being distributed among 
the primary schools of the city for practice work while the 
other was under instruction. 

The school soon outgrew the Bush Street building, and 
three branch classes were opened in a rented building, on 
Market Street nearly a mile away, and later two or three 
classes were located in the old high-school building on 
Powell Street near Clay. 

The distribution of the pupils in three buildings a mile 
apart was a great disadvantage to the school. Aside from 
the loss of time by principal and special teachers in traveling 
a daily round of three miles, no number of scattered classes 
could constitute a school in the full sense of the term. 
There was a pressing need for a centrally located building 
capable of accommodating one thousand pupils, but there 
was no money to be obtained for that purpose. Mean- 



224 THE GIRLS' HIGH SCHOOL 

while, with every change in the board of education there 
was more or less tinkering on the course of study. At one 
time a commercial member of the board insisted on forcing 
the study of commercial bookkeeping into the school, making 
it immediately compulsory on every class from the lowest to 
the highest, including the normal class. When the term of 
this school director expired, bookkeeping was discontinued. 

I think it was in 1882, during the summer vacation, that 
a secret movement was made to abolish the normal de- 
partment, which then had grown to three classes number- 
ing one hundred and fifty students. I discovered the plot 
and immediately went to the president of the board, 
Mr. Stubbs, of the Central Pacific Railroad. I said, "Mr. 
Stubbs, I hear the board intend to abolish the normal de- 
partment of the high school; is my information correct?" 

He answered "Yes, it is. There are too many teachers 
already." 

"Mr. Stubbs, you are a business man, and I want to 
make you a business proposition. Limit the normal de- 
partment to one class of fifty students, selecting from the 
graduates of the high school those who stand highest in 
scholarship. The city can afford the cost of one teacher 
for the normal class." 

"That's a fair business proposition. I'll accept it," said 
he. The business was settled in less than five minutes, 
and the class was saved. Meanwhile all my efforts to 
secure a larger building ended in failure. 

The Kindergarten Movement in San Francisco 

Felix Adler of New York City made a visit to San Fran- 
cisco in 1878 and began a movement which ended in the 
establishment of the Silver Street Kindergarten school 



SARAH B. COOPER 225 

under the management of Miss Kate Douglas Smith, who 
afterwards, as Mrs. Kate Douglas Wiggin, became widely 
known as an author. Soon after this school was opened 
I visited it, and, on request of the principal, detailed two 
student teachers, partly as assistants and partly as students 
of kindergarten methods. Then I called the attention of 
Mrs. Sarah B. Cooper to the school. As she was a born 
philanthropist, she became deeply interested in the work, 
and proposed to start another class in what was known as 
the "Barbary Coast," — the old "Five Points" of San 
Francisco. She soon secured by subscription the money to 
pay the rent of a building and also to pay a teacher. I went 
with her to explore the region and select a suitable location. 
When the school opened I detailed as assistants two student 
teachers, one of whom was my own daughter, Emily Tracy 
Swett. Next I organized a class of children between five 
and six years of age, in a vacant room, kept the school 
running for three months under the entire charge of pupils 
from the normal class, and finally, with Mrs. Cooper's 
assistance, succeeded in 1880 in making it a free public 
school under the name of the " Experimental Class." One 
year later a second class was opened in connection with 
Mrs. Cooper's kindergarten school on Union Street. 

Mrs. Cooper entered on the free kindergarten work with 
her whole soul. She was a woman of marked literary 
ability. For many years she earned enough with her pen 
to aid in the support of her family and in the education of 
her sister's children in Memphis, Tennessee. She had no 
money to contribute to the kindergarten cause, but she 
gave what was needed more than money, — the wealth of 
her clear intellect, her winning manner, and her devoted 
Christian philanthropy. It was through her influence that 



226 THE GIRLS' HIGH SCHOOL 

Mrs. Leland Stanford became interested in the work and 
finally endowed three kindergarten schools with one hun- 
dred thousand dollars for their support. Mrs. Phoebe 
Hearst was induced by Mrs. Cooper's persuasive power to 
endow another kindergarten school. A large number of 
citizens subscribed five dollars a month, each, for the support 
of other classes. The Golden Gate Kindergarten Associa- 
tion was organized, and in ten years there were forty-six 
kindergarten classes supported entirely by endowments and 
subscriptions. Mrs. Cooper's annual reports were distrib- 
uted and read wherever the English language is spoken. 

After the death of Mrs. Cooper's husband, she still con- 
tinued her management of the kindergarten schools, her 
daughter Hattie meanwhile supporting the family by giving 
music lessons. Mrs. Cooper steadily refused to receive a 
dollar for services, though persistently urged by the officers 
of the association to accept a salary. Once when I urged 
her to yield to the wishes of the association, she replied, 
"This is the Lord's work, and I feel it would not be blessed 
if I received pay for it." She held frequent consultations 
with me about any new undertakings, and probably there 
is no person living who knows more fully than myself the 
extent of her labors, and the wealth of philanthropic devo- 
tion and Christian self-sacrifice that she brought to the work 
of training, reforming, and educating the children of the poor 
in San Francisco. Her sad and sudden death cast a gloom 
over the city in which her great work was accomplished. 

Incidental Educational Work 

In 1875 I proposed to H. H. Bancroft and Company of 
San Francisco, that if the firm would publish a brief history 
of the California school system, I would furnish the manu- 



INCIDENTAL EDUCATIONAL WORK 227 

script without compensation and without copyright. My 
reason for this was that I thought there ought to be some 
book of reference in which should be gathered the fragmen- 
tary bits of school history at that time scattered in forgotten 
or destroyed reports. The firm accepted the proposition 
and issued the prospectus of such a book. The replies to 
this circular were not reassuring and the firm declined the 
risk of publication. As most of the volume was ready for 
the printer, I then decided to publish it at my own ex- 
pense, as a personal contribution to the public-school his- 
tory of the state. An edition of- one thousand copies was 
printed at a cost of $900. Sales were made to the amount 
of $400, four hundred copies I gave away, and a few copies 
still remain as an addition to my own library. This book 
is no longer for sale, but special students may find copies of 
it in the State University library. This history was made 
up of brief abstracts of the reports of state superintendents ; 
of the successive steps in school legislation; of sketches of 
state teachers' institutes; of full tables of statistics; and 
of several educational addresses that seemed to be worth 
publishing. 

It was a part of my school duties to give occasional talks 
to the normal class on methods of instruction, as a supple- 
ment to their textbook study of Russell's " Normal Train- 
ing." Then I fell into the habit of summarizing these 
informal talks into condensed written statements, some of 
which were dictated to students and taken down in their 
notebooks. At length, when the one class had increased 
to three classes, it occurred to me to put these condensed 
directions into book form for more convenient use. Accord- 
ingly I supplemented these notes with working models in 
arithmetic, geography, grammar, and composition, which 



228 THE GIRLS' HIGH SCHOOL 

I had used when principal of a grammar school, and sub- 
mitted the manuscript to Mr. Emerson, of the schoolbook 
department of Harper and Brothers. The book was 
accepted by the house and published in 1880. Four thou- 
sand copies were sold in less than a year, and for ten suc- 
ceeding years the sales were about a thousand copies 
annually. The press notices of "Methods of Teaching" 
were highly complimentary to this unpretentious volume. 1 
I may add that " Methods of Teaching" was warmly 
welcomed in some of the Southern states by the young men 
and young women that were teaching in the newly estab- 
lished common schools. These teachers had been fairly 
educated in academies, but had received no normal school 
instruction in detailed methods suited to public schools. 
From time to time I received many letters from them, 
stating that the writers, though strangers to me, could not 
resist the impulse to thank me for the inspiration my book 

1 The New England Journal of Education (Boston) said of it in a leading 
editorial: " This book by John Swett reads like a catalogue of educational 
maxims which have survived in a twenty years' war of schoolmasters and 
children in the most vigorous of new American states. Every paragraph 
has a fist in it. With the broadest outlook over modern theories of instruc- 
tion, the author does not attempt to give us either a philosophy or a theory; 
but in a series of forcible and concise chapters, illustrated by working models 
and illuminated by numerous apt quotations from the leading -school author- 
ities of the modern world, he comes to the aid of every teacher in the land. 
The most inexperienced teacher in a plantation school in South Carolina 
and the most famous master in New York will find on every page a direction 
so full of common sense, so appreciative of childhood, so respectful of broad 
culture, so pregnant with patriotism, that the most natural thing to be done 
will be to dash off a hasty vote of thanks to the author. We commend this 
volume to all teachers in all sorts of schools. But especially would we urge 
the young teachers in the common schools of the South and the more isolated 
schools of the North where the means of normal training are not at hand, to 
buy this book and read it till the intense and powerful spirit of its author 
moves to a new insight and consecration to work." 



II 



METHODS OF TEACHING" 229 



had given them in their daily work under discouraging 
conditions. 

I call to mind an evening visit at my home in San Fran- 
cisco, made by two accomplished ladies from Selma, Georgia, 
introducing themselves as teachers on a vacation trip to 
California, who had learned how to teach from a book 
written by John Swett whom they desired to thank per- 
sonally for having lent them a helping hand. 

At the recent charter-day exercises of the University of 
California (March, 1906), I had the great pleasure of 
listening to an eloquent address by the well-known speaker, 
educator, and lecturer, Edwin A. Alderman, president of 
the University of Virginia. After the exercises were over, 
when President Wheeler introduced me to President Alder- 
man, the latter exclaimed as he cordially grasped my hand : 
"Mr. Swett, I am glad to meet you. I have known you for 
many years through your book on c Methods of Teaching ' 
which I used when I was learning how to teach. You are 
an old friend." 

The New Constitution 

At the annual meeting of the State Teachers' Association 
in Sacramento, June, 1878, I submitted for approval, to 
the small number of members in attendance, three sections 
relating to education which I intended to bring before the 
convention that had been elected to revise the state con- 
stitution. One of these sections provided that county 
superintendents should be elected for the term of four 
years instead of two years. This was approved by the 
State Association, though nobody except myself believed 
that this extension of the term of office could be secured. 
It was afterwards adopted by the constitutional convention 



230 THE GIRLS' HIGH SCHOOL 

without objection. Another section which I submitted 
read as follows: u The public school system shall include 
primary and grammar schools, and such high schools, even- 
ing schools, normal schools, and technical schools as may 
be established by the legislature or by municipal or district 
authority." The State Association approved this section, 
but added an unfortunate amendment, which subsequently 
led to trouble in organizing high schools. This proviso 
read as follows : ' ( but the entire revenue derived from the state 
school fund and the state school tax shall be applied exclu- 
sively to the support of primary and grammar schools" This 
amendment was offered by an able high-school teacher, not 
for the purpose of discrimination against high schools, but 
to help along, as he supposed, the adoption of the original 
section, the opinion prevailing that otherwise the conven- 
tion would reject it. The section was afterwards adopted 
by the constitutional convention without opposition, but 
the original section without the proviso would have been 
passed in the same manner. 

It was owing to the timidity of the teachers themselves 
in asking for what they really wanted, not to any hostility 
to high schools in the constitutional convention, that high 
schools and technical schools were not included in the state 
apportionment of school moneys. Another section which 
I drafted was approved by the association and afterwards 
by the constitutional convention without material change. 
This section reads as follows: 

Sec. 8. No public money shall ever be appropriated for the support 
of any sectarian or denominational school or any school not under the 
exclusive control of the officers of the public schools; nor shall any sec- 
tarian or denominational doctrine be taught, or instruction thereon be 
permitted, directly or indirectly, in any of the common schools of this 
state. 



JOHN MUIR 231 

These sections were placed in the hands of a county 
superintendent who was a member elect of the constitu- 
tional convention, and by him placed before the committee 
on education, together with the resolution of approval by 
the State Teachers' Association. 

My Acquaintance with John Muir 

In the winter of 1874 I first met John Muir in the city 
of Oakland, where I found him engaged in writing an article 
about his studies on glacial action in the Sierra Nevada 
mountain range. We at once established a close friendship, 
which has continued unbroken for more than a third of 
a century. Soon after our first meeting I persuaded him 
to come to San Francisco and occupy a vacant room in 
my house. He was to become a member of my household 
for three months without charge, and in return he was to 
go with me during the next summer vacation as a guide 
into the Yosemite Valley and the surrounding mountain 
region, in company with J. B. McChesney, the veteran 
principal of the Oakland High School, and William Keith, 
who was then beginning his successful career as a landscape 
painter. 

At that time Mr. Muir was engaged in writing for the 
Overland Monthly a series of articles on mountain sculpture. 
After long and urgent persuasion on my part, he consented 
to prepare for Harper's Magazine an illustrated article on 
California mountain scenery. Mr. Keith, who like Mr. 
Muir was born in Scotland, dropped into Mr. Muir's room 
two or three evenings a week and lent his aid in selecting 
illustrations from sketches taken from Muir's notebooks. 
The editor of Harper's Magazine accepted his first article 
and asked for other papers. Those long evening meetings 



232 THE GIRLS' HIGH SCHOOL 

in Muir's study room are among the pleasant recollections 
of my life. 

In June following we made our visit to the Yosemite 
Valley, secured our outfit of saddle horses and equipments 
for camp life, and started out on a four weeks' trip into the 
high Sierras above the valley. We did our own cooking and 
had no guide except Mr. Muir. We camped near the "soda 
springs" in the Tuolumne meadows; crossed through the 
Mono Pass down Bloody Canyon to the dead sea of Mono 
Lake; thence struck southward along the range for forty 
miles, and then climbed upward into the mountains and 
encamped for several days in a glacial meadow nine thou- 
sand feet above sea level, in the loveliest little mountain 
nook that my eyes ever beheld. Thence we ascended 
various mountain peaks, returning at night to camp. On 
our return trip we visited the Lyell glacier. Under the 
instruction of Mr. Muir, every day was crowded with the 
richest and rarest of lessons. 

During the following winter Mr. Muir again made his 
home in my family. It was this intimate friendship that 
led me in 1881 to purchase a tract of land adjoining his 
home in Alhambra Valley, near Martinez, and begin upon 
it the planting of an orchard and vineyard to make a 
country home when it should become possible for me to 
retire from school life. It was during this time that my 
youngest daughter Helen, then about three years old, 
became a special pet in Mr. Muir's study. My son, Frank 
Tracy Swett, then six years old, was also a frequent and 
welcome visitor to Mr. Muir's room. 

Mr. Muir's articles in Harper's Magazine were followed 
a year later by a series of papers in Scribner's Magazine, 
and later still, another series of articles appeared in the Cen- 



HENRY GEORGE 233 

tury Magazine. His first book, "The Mountains of Cali- 
fornia," was published by the Century Company (1892); 
his second book, "Our National Parks," appeared in 1902, 
published by Houghton, Mifflin and Company. Both 
of these books are invaluable to all lovers . of mountain 
and forest scenery and to teachers interested in nature 
study. As a keen observer and poetic interpreter of nature, 
as an enthusiastic explorer in California, Alaska, and the 
Rocky Mountain regions, John Muir stands without a 
rival. He combines strict scientific accuracy with poetic 
expression in a manner that lends a singular charm to his 
writings. 

Henry George 

My acquaintance with Henry George began at the time 
he was publishing a daily evening paper in San Francisco, 
and continued during the period that he was engaged in 
writing " Progress and Poverty." He was a genial friend, 
and I often dropped into his home on Sunday evenings. 
When he brought out in San Francisco, at his own expense, 
the first edition of his now famous book, I subscribed for 
ten copies of it, and when I paid him he said in a pathetic 
tone, "Swett, this is the first money I have ever received 
for my book." His receipt ran as follows: 

San Francisco, May 23, 1879. 

Received of John Swett twenty-five dollars ($2 5), in payment for ten copies 
of the book "Progress and Poverty." Henry George. 

When the books were delivered I kept one copy, and pre- 
sented the others to personal friends. 

During the setting up of his book, Mr. George had asked 
me to run over the proof sheets to detect any ungram- 



234 THE GIRLS' HIGH SCHOOL 

matical constructions. He said, "All I know about Eng- 
lish grammar was picked up in a printing office, and I may 
have made mistakes." But I found his English so good 
that it needed no correction by a schoolmaster. His polit- 
ical economy and his land-tax views we never discussed. 

I can well understand how the idea grew in his mind that 
"the rich are growing richer, and the poor are growing 
poorer." His book was written during what is known in 
San Francisco as the "sand-lot period," when times were 
very hard and there was much real poverty. The city was 
crowded with men from all parts of the state, seeking for 
work but unable to find it. Mass meetings were held on 
the sand lots near the city hall. Dennis Kearney was the 
leader and chief spokesman of the agitators. It really 
seemed as if the foundations of society were breaking up. 
A part of George's book took its tone from these hard times. 
I told him that under existing conditions in San Francisco 
there was no room for him, and urged him, again and again, 
to go to New York, where his talent would be better recog- 
nized. Other friends gave him similar advice, and to New 
York he went, there to win success as a reformer, a lecturer, 
and an author of books on political economy and land-value 
taxation. 

Personal Matters 

My uneventful life as a school principal was made up 
of the routine work common to all teachers. During this 
period, as a relief from the monotony of school life, I was 
more or less engaged in some kind of literary work which 
occupied my leisure time. In 1880 I prepared a book 
entitled " School Elocution," designed for use in high schools 
and normal schools, which was published by A. L. Ban- 



PERSONAL MATTERS 235 

croft and Company and afterwards transferred by that 
linn to Harper and Brothers. This book had a fair sale for 
several years, but it never went into extensive use. It was 
perhaps unfortunate in its title; besides, it did not treat of 
dramatic elocutionary training for platform readings. It was 
really a high-grade reading book designed to develop the 
ability to read with effect good standard selections of prose 
and poetry. Next I prepared the third and the fourth 
books of a series of readers for the Bancroft Company. 

In 1879 there was born to us in our home on Taylor 
Street the last of our family of six children, John French 
Swett. In 1 88 1 my eldest child, Emily Tracy Swett, was 
graduated from the normal class of the Girls' High School. 
In the volunteer kindergarten work, in one of Mrs. Cooper's 
schools, she showed a marked talent for teaching. For two 
years I tried hard to secure a position for her in a primary 
class at fifty dollars a month, but without success. Mem- 
bers of the board of education told me that they would like 
to give her a place, but the political pressure was so strong 
that they had no power to make appointments on merit. 
Finally she obtained a position as teacher of French in a 
private seminary. Next she became a teacher of music, 
and then gave up teaching, established a literary bureau, 
and organized the Pacific Coast Women's Press Association. 
After the year 1880, indeed, it was seldom that any graduate 
of the normal class, however talented, was able to secure 
a position in the city schools. The city government had 
drifted into the control of political "bosses," and teachers 
were appointed mainly through political or personal favor- 
itism. The best graduates of the city normal class went 
out into the remote district schools of the state, in which 
they performed missionary work. I did, however, secure, 



236 THE GIRLS' HIGH SCHOOL 

in 1884, from a strong partisan board, a standing rule that 
each year the one graduate of the normal class who attained 
the highest standing should receive for a reward an appoint- 
ment as teacher in a primary school. 

The National Educational Association 

The year 1888 was a notable one in the educational 
annals of San Francisco on account of the meeting of the 
National Educational Association held in that city, July 
17-22. The convention was very large, and the Eastern 
educators were greeted with enthusiasm and royally enter- 
tained. Aaron Gove presided with grace and dignity. 
Among the well-known educators from other states were 
William T. Harris, of Massachusetts; Louis Soldan, of 
St. Louis; J. M. Greenwood, of Missouri; John W. Cook, 
of Illinois; Jerome Allen, of New York; John Hancock, of 
Ohio; E. C. Hewett, of Illinois; W. E. Sheldon, of Boston; 
James H. Baker, of Colorado; J. L. Pickard, of Chicago, and 
others too numerous to mention. I had been invited to 
prepare a paper on "The Relation of the State to School- 
books and Appliances." As this topic is still a vexed one, 
and as yet an undecided question, I give here some brief 
extracts from my paper on that occasion. 

After a study of the school laws and school systems of the several states 
in the Union, it is evident that school laws have followed the general law of 
evolution, beginning with simple functions and becoming more complex and 
differentiated with the general development of society in population, wealth, 
and civilization. The general tendency has been to enlarge the powers of 
both state and local laws and regulations. 

In the beginning, the state required by law that a public school should be 
kept in every school district for three months in the year, provided for the 
formation of school districts and the election of school trustees, but left all 
other powers, such as the voting of school taxes, the building of schoolhouses, 
and the control of schools in general, to school districts, to counties, or to cities. 



SCHOOL BOOKS AND APPLIANCES 237 

The general principle may be roughly stated as follows: The scope of state 
law in relation to schools has been whatever the people have chosen to 
make it in order to meet the evident needs of the schools in different 
stages of development. 

As to school appliances I can speak from personal experience. When I 
began to go to school, fifty years ago, in a New Hampshire village, there was 
a summer school of three months taught by a woman, and a winter school of 
three months taught by a man. The summer school was generally supple- 
mented by a tuition or private school for a month or more. Out of this New 
England custom of supplementing the free school by tuition fees, there grew 
up the rate-bill system, which prevailed in most states for a long time, and 
which still maintains a lingering existence. In California the rate bill was 
abolished by law in 1868, the same year that the.state of New York got rid 
of the incubus that had weighed upon her rural schools for more than a 
century. 

Fifty years ago pupils, except in some incorporated cities, bought their 
own pens, ink, paper, pencils, slates, books, and all other school appliances. 
The school apparatus consisted of a piece of chalk and one small blackboard, 
six feet by three. This was the condition of things in California only a few 
years ago. In 1863, when revising the school law, I incorporated a provision 
requiring school trustees and boards of education to supply to pupils, free, 
all minor school appliances, such as pens, ink, paper, pencils, crayons, wash- 
basins, etc., and nobody, so far as I know, grumbled about it. This law 
also provided that free textbooks should be supplied to pupils whose 
parents presented evidence of inability to buy them. The history of other 
States shows the same general tendency toward free minor supplies. 

The original unit for the adoption of textbooks was the school district, 
or the chartered city. This was succeeded in course of time by town adop- 
tion in the New England states, and by county adoption in the Southern 
and Western states. Finally, a few states and territories have tried the 
experiment of a uniform State Series, adopted by a state board of education. 
Take California as an illustration. 

From the organization of schools in 1850 up to 1863, cities having local 
boards of education were authorized to adopt textbooks, and so were the 
local rural school districts; but in these districts it generally happened that 
there was a heterogeneous mixture of such books as the pupils happened 
to have on hand. As a result of this evil the rural teachers were clamoring 
for state uniformity. So in 1863, when I came into the office of state super- 
intendent, I drew up a bill, which became a law, providing, except in incor- 
porated cities, for the adoption of a uniform state series of textbooks. But 
this law applied to only about one-third of the school children — that is, to 



238 THE GIRLS' HIGH SCHOOL 

those in the small rural districts. But in 1868 the incorporated cities were 
placed under the jurisdiction of the state board of education and trouble 
began immediately. 

So great was the popular dissatisfaction that, when the State Constitu- 
tion was revised in 1879, it contained a provision for county adoption by 
county boards. Again, in consequence of popular clamor about changes in 
textbooks, an amendment to the constitution was adopted in 1884, provid- 
ing for a uniform state series to be edited by the state board of education, 
printed by the state printer, and sold at cost price. This action lies outside 
of what has generally been considered the proper scope of state law. 

As to free textbooks, until within a few years they were seldom supplied 
at public expense, but there are two notable exceptions. The schools of New 
York City have been supplied with free books since 1806, the year in which 
public schools were fully organized in that city. The reasons urged in 1806 
hold good to the present day. They were: (1) to guard against invidious 
distinction among pupils on account of indigence; (2) To facilitate uniform 
and prompt supplies; (3) To guard against extravagance. In Philadelphia, 
free books have been supplied since 181 8, the date of the organization of free 
schools in that city. It remained for Massachusetts, the cradle of free schools 
in their infancy, to make, in 1884, the most notable advance among the states. 
A law was then enacted requiring free books throughout the state, the books 
to be adopted and purchased by local boards of education. 

The verdict of the people is that this measure is wise, beneficent, and eco- 
nomical. Other states are now following the example of Massachusetts. 
There is no mistaking the tendency of this evolution. It is natural that the 
views of teachers and educators should be biased in favor of the laws and cus- 
toms of the state in which they reside; but an impartial survey of our whole 
country shows that the evolution of school law is, with a few sporadic excep- 
tions, toward free supplies, free textbooks, and toward city, town, or county 
uniformity. 

Affairs in the Girls' High School 

Meanwhile, the Girls' High School moved along with 
varied fortunes. It was in 1885, 1 think, that seventy-five 
pupils from the highest grade of the grammar schools failed 
to pass the annual written examination for admission to 
the two city high schools. The board of education passed 
an order that they should all be promoted on trial. The 
Girls' High School thus received a class of forty-five girls 



A REIGN OF TERROR 239 

entirely unfitted for high-school work. After a trial of 
three months we reported them as " failures," but the board 
insisted that they should remain in the school. At the end 
of the year they failed to be promoted, and the parents, as 
well as most of the members of the board, laid the blame 
on the teachers and the principal. 

Furthermore, the teacher of a class in general history 
and Latin, Henry E. Senger, made some remarks on a 
topic in medieval history which offended some Catholic 
parents; whereupon he was disciplined by the board and 
the school superintendent with a suspension for one month. 
I endeavored to save him from this sentence, but without 
avail. He resigned, and secured a position in the University 
of California as assistant professor in German. The high 
school was left without a Latin teacher, and the board 
neglected to appoint another to the vacancy. In 1888, 
during the summer vacation, when I was absent from the 
city, the board of education adopted a new course of study 
without any consultation with the teachers or the principal, 
materially changing the organization of the school. Long 
afterwards I learned that it was hoped that this action 
would secure my resignation. 

At this time the political condition of San Francisco was 
deplorable. Christopher Buckley, known as " the blind 
boss," had secured absolute control of the city government. 
Mr. Buckley had been trained to politics in the city of 
New York, and he set up in San Francisco a local "Tam- 
many Hall." The president of the board of education, 
Buckley's lieutenant, died several years ago, and I need not 
mention his name nor characterize his acts. There was a 
reign of terror in the school department. During the school 
year 1887-88 I worked hard to bring order out of chaos 



240 THE GIRLS' HIGH SCHOOL 

in the high school, but the whole political power was against 
me. The political "boss" of the board of education first 
demanded the resignation of George W. Minns, the 
veteran high-school and normal-school teacher, on the 
ground that he was "too old to teach school." Deeply 
grieved, Mr. Minns resigned from the Girls' High School 
and returned to Boston. For the same reason one of the 
oldest and ablest teachers in the school, Mrs. Dorcas Clark, 
was requested to resign, and she retired to grieve over her 
great wrong. Another veteran teacher was given a leave 
of absence, and she did not again return to the school. 
The remaining teachers were alarmed and dissatisfied, but 
they did the best they could under trying conditions. 

When the term closed in May, 1889, I knew that my 
turn would come next. During the vacation the "boss" 
of the board requested my resignation, which I sent in 
without any explanation. I had too much pride to submit 
to further humiliation and insult. I did not intend to be 
publicly tried and dismissed by a packed jury under the 
control of a political boss. I have never regretted my 
action. The main complaint urged against me was that 
I was too old, and I had to plead guilty to the fact that I 
was fifty-nine years of age. It was a pet idea of the " boss " 
of the board that no man or woman was fit to teach school 
after forty years of age. At the next succeeding election 
the boss of the board disappeared forever from public 
office. As for myself, though I retired under a cloud of 
misrepresentations and petty persecutions, I received my 
vindication at the hands of the citizens of San Francisco 
in the general election a year and a half later, at which I 
was elected city superintendent of schools by the over- 
whelming majority of two-thirds of the entire vote cast. 



LATER HISTORY OF THE SCHOOL 24 1 

During the time that I was principal of the high school, 
from 1876 to 1889, thirteen years, the total number of 
graduates was 13 12, or an average of 101 a year. From 
the normal class during the same period, the number of 
graduates was 844, or an average of 65 a year. My reputa- 
tion as a teacher is safe in the memories of these graduates. 

My successor was Mrs. Mary W. Kincaid, instead of the 
man who had been " slated" for the position by the boss 
of the board. Soon after, the high school building was 
burned to the ground, and the school was quartered in a 
primary school building. After two or three years, Mrs. 
Kincaid found the position intolerable, and resigned. The 
normal class maintained a lingering existence for several 
years, and was then disconnected from the high school, and 
made a "City Normal School," in the old Powell Street 
building, the home of the pioneer high school in California. 
Miss Laura T. Fowler was made principal, and Mrs. M. E. 
Fitzgerald, one of the early graduates of the Girls' High 
School and normal class, was made assistant. 

This school continued to flourish until, in 1898, when a 
hostile city board of education suddenly abolished it on 
the ground that it was no longer needed, and was an un- 
necessary expense to the city. But a committee of indig- 
nant citizens went to the state legislature in 1899 and 
secured the passage of a bill to reestablish it, as a state 
normal school. The board of state normal school trus- 
tees appointed as president Frederic Burke, under whose 
energetic management the school has become noted for its 
attention to the art of teaching, rather than to academic 
scholarship or metaphysical psychology. 

At a recent meeting of the California Teachers' Asso- 
ciation, July, 1905, I shook glad hands with scores of the 



242 THE GIRLS' HIGH SCHOOL 

earlier graduates of the normal class who are now occupy- 
ing honorable positions as teachers in many parts of Cali- 
fornia. One is vice-principal of the John Swett Grammar 
School in San Francisco; another is principal of a large 
grammar school in San Francisco; another is principal 
of a large primary school; and still another, vice-principal 
of the Mission High School in the same city. Large num- 
bers of those graduates became pioneers in remote rural 
schools in different parts of the state, and very few of them 
have made a failure. Several hundred of them are doing 
good service as successful grade teachers in the elementary 
schools of San Francisco, Oakland, and Alameda. 1 

1 As I was standing on the platform at Hearst Hall in Berkeley, receiving 
the congratulations of my friends after the presentation, by the teachers, tp 
the State University of a portrait of myself, and its acceptance by President 
Wheeler in behalf of the Board of Regents of the University of California, 
an incident occurred which deeply moved my feelings. A pleasant-faced 
teacher approached me and said: "Mr. Swett, I came down to this meeting 
from a remote county in the hope that I might meet you here. Perhaps you 
will recall me when I tell you that I am the young woman from Canada that 
called at your office in the Girls' High School in 1886, and asked you if it 
would be possible for me to be admitted into the Normal School. After 
questioning me about where I had been educated, you told me that under the 
rules of the board you could not admit me; but you added, that if I was in 
earnest about becoming a teacher, perhaps you could help me. Though 
not enrolled as a regular member of the class, I was given a seat and a set of 
books and all the privileges of the class. You advised me to remain until the 
end of the term and then you thought that I could probably pass a county 
examination and secure a country school. I secured both, and have been 
teaching ever since. I have won a reputation as a successful teacher. And 
I want to say to you that there has never been a day since I began to teach, 
that, as I entered my schoolroom, I did not think of you and your kindness 
in lending me a hand when I needed help." 

My own heart was swelling with gratitude to my fellow teachers for the 
honor they had done me that day, and with this story of one of my former 
pupils, I felt my eyes "cloud up for rain." 



CHAPTER XIV 

ELECTION AS CITY SUPERINTENDENT OF PUBLIC SCHOOLS 

IN SAN FRANCISCO 

After my resignation I retired at once to Hill Girt farm 
near Martinez, and busied myself with the management of 
an orchard and a vineyard. The sudden change from 
school life to farm work was something of a wrench for 
the first six months, but at the end of that time I found 
myself in fair health and good spirits. At the end of a year 
there were signs of a revolution in city politics, and it 
became probable that Christopher Buckley and his satel- 
lites, together with the board of education, would be driven 
out of power. The city superintendent of schools had 
received the nomination of the Republican party for state 
superintendent of public instruction, leaving the city office 
open for a new candidate. My friends in the city, indignant 
at the treatment to which I had been subjected, began to 
urge me to become a candidate. I held out for some time 
against this movement, but finally gave way to the pressure 
and allowed the use of my name as a candidate, with the 
condition that no personal effort on my part was to be 
required in securing the nomination. When the Repub- 
lican convention assembled I received the nomination by 
acclamation. At the election following, I received two- 
thirds of the entire vote cast, having the highest vote of 
any candidate on the ticket. 

Thus the people of San Francisco triumphantly vindi- 
cated my reputation by a very emphatic vote of approval. 

243 



244 CITY SUPERINTENDENT 

Until that campaign I never realized how many friends I 
had, nor how true they were. The Examiner, the leading 
Democratic paper, came out editorially in my support. 
My former pupils in the high school, the Denman Grammar 
School, and the Rincon School, canvassed the city by scores 
and hundreds, calling at the offices of merchants and busi- 
ness men to solicit votes for me. 

One day as I was passing along Market Street, a group 
of three men hailed me, and one of them called out: 

"Hold on a minute, Mr. Swett; we want to speak to you. 
Do you know why we Irishmen think so much of you?" 

"Indeed I don't," I replied; "I didn't suppose that you 
knew me at all." 

"But we know all about you. Our children went to 
school to you when you were in the Rincon School, years 
ago, and we know that you always treated a poor man's 
boy just as well as you did a rich man's son. We are all 
Democrats, and you are on the Republican ticket, but we are 
going to vote for you, sure." 

I thanked them for one of the highest compliments that I 
had ever received and replied, "When I was a hard-working 
boy, many years ago on a New Hampshire farm, I was as 
good an Andrew Jackson Democrat as the best of you." 
Then another of these warm-hearted men laughingly broke 
out with, "It's true, Mr. Swett, you haven't any handle 
to your name, before it nor after it, but you always get 
there just the same." 

A few minutes later I met Mr. Donelly whose four 
daughters were under my care in the Denman Grammar 
School, and in the Girls' High School. He gripped my hand 
till it ached, saying : " I'm glad to see you, Mr. Swett. I owe 
you a great deal for your kindness to my girls. You know 



A NEW COURSE OF STUDY 245 

I am a poor man, but I have a hundred dollars laid by, and 
if you need it to help pay your election expenses, you are 
welcome to the use of it until you can pay it back when you 
are elected." 

I thanked him warmly, but told him that I did not need 
any help, and that my election assessment of seven hun- 
dred dollars made by the county committee, was already 
paid in full with my own money, and beyond that I did 
not intend to spend a dollar. As I write this page in the 
year 1907, a daughter of this generous-hearted Irishman is 
vice-principal of the Mission High School, of which the 
principal is Joseph O'Connor, whom I had the pleasure of 
introducing to a class in bookkeeping in the Lincoln even- 
ing school. 

On the first Monday in January, 1891, I entered on the 
duties of my office. For the first two months I was en- 
gaged in revising and codifying the rules and regulations 
of the board, and in learning the routine work. Then I 
began a visiting tour to every school and class in the de- 
partment, and at the end of three months I knew something 
about the educational condition of the schools from per- 
sonal inspection. Next I called a series of meetings of the 
teachers, by grades, for the purpose of discussing the course 
of study and of proposing some changes for the coming 
school year. For three months I went to my office at 
seven o'clock in the morning and worked on the details of 
a new course of study until nine o'clock, the hour for opening 
the office doors, thus securing two hours a day of uninter- 
rupted thought. To this work, also, I devoted every day 
of the six weeks of summer vacation, in order to have the 
course ready for the opening of school in July. 

This revised course of study was by no means an ideal 



246 CITY SUPERINTENDENT 

one, but it was adapted to the prevailing conditions. The 
state textbooks required by law were entirely unsuited to 
the needs of graded schools. Unfortunately a majority of 
the grade teachers taught mainly by means of memorized 
lessons, marked out by certain prescribed pages of the text- 
books. This division of work by pages was in the main 
left undisturbed. But the outlines in textbooks were sup- 
plemented by many pages of suggestions which involved 
modern psychological and pedagogical principles. The 
whole course consisted of a volume of two hundred pages, 
and the size of it at first alarmed many conservative teach- 
ers who imagined that it was harder because it was longer 
than the old course. The chief merit of this manual was 
that it allowed greater freedom to progressive teachers, sim- 
plified the work in arithmetic and grammar, and provided 
for supplementary reading matter. 

In visiting the schools I found many things to commend. 
The essentials to be learned by children in the five primary 
grades are reading, writing, spelling, arithmetic, and enough 
of language to write a letter correctly. All these things 
were well done in the classes that I visited. In all the 
schools the children were quick at figures; and in some 
schools they were accurate. The main criticism made on 
the teaching of arithmetic in the primary grades was the 
general tendency to make use of long, complex, and tire- 
some operations with very large numbers, instead of simple, 
short, business drill on ordinary business forms of reckon- 
ing. But this was not so much the fault of the teachers as 
it was of the textbooks, and of interminable written exami- 
nations which tended to worry and puzzle children instead 
of instructing them. 

In respect to supplementary reading I found the city 



APPOINTMENT OF TEACHERS 247 

schools ten years behind the times in comparison with many 
of the rural district schools of California. My report to the 
board of education on this matter reads as follows: 

" I beg leave to call your attention to the state school law in relation 
to school libraries. The revised school law of 1866, which, slightly 
amended, has remained in force ever since, provides that 10 per cent of 
the state apportionment of school money to each district, not to exceed 
$50, shall be set apart as a school library fund, to be expended exclu- 
sively in buying books for school libraries. In incorporated cities the amount 
so reserved is $50 for every 1000 census children. This law has been 
strictly observed throughout the state except in San Francisco, where, 
for ten years, through ignorance or defiance of law, the library money 
has been diverted to other purposes. I recommend the board to comply 
with the law." 

By custom as well as by law, the superintendent had 
nothing whatever to do with the appointment of teachers. 
He was allowed a seat in the board, but had no vote. He 
was given no power to decide anything, not even to send 
out a substitute teacher for a single day. He could not 
suspend or reinstate a pupil. He was required by law to 
make monthly reports to the board, to sign warrants, and 
to visit schools. He was expected to revise the course of 
study from time to time and report it to the board for adop- 
tion. Though nominally he was the executive officer of 
the board, all the executive work was really divided up 
among the several committees. 

By unwritten law, for many years the patronage of 
appointing teachers had been mathematically divided 
among the board members, each director in alphabetical 
order being allowed to appoint a teacher when his turn came 
round. The worst of such a plan was that the members 
themselves were not free agents in making appointments, 
but were compelled to yield to the demands of partisan 
" bosses," or political leaders, or ward politicians. During 



248 CITY SUPERINTENDENT 

my term of office, I can recall but one instance in which 
my opinion of the fitness of a teacher for appointment was 
asked by a school director. One director, a personal friend, 
once showed me his memorandum list of over one hundred 
applicants for a position, each one backed by strong influences. 
Under this system the best men in the board, along with 
the weakest, were compelled to yield. One director, nomi- 
nated by myself to fill a vacancy, in less than a month after 
his appointment by the board, showed me a letter from a 
United States senator from California, earnestly demand- 
ing the appointment of a young lady to the position of a 
primary teacher. Another boasted of the fact that he had 
appointed three teachers by the request of a notable mil- 
lionaire. At another period, some years previous to this, 
there were several political "school brokers" who engaged 
to secure appointments for the sum of three hundred 
dollars each. These brokers pocketed the money, and 
secured appointments by political or personal pull. 

My second annual report, 1892-93, was a document of 
two hundred pages which treated of various topics, among 
which were the following: School visits; revised course of 
study; individuality in teachers; physical training; home' 
study; average daily attendance per class; names of schools; 
the Golden Gate free kindergartens; historical sketches of 
city high schools and the evening schools ; overwork in the 
high schools; historical notes of early school history in San 
Francisco; the Kate Kennedy case; election of teachers; 
and the manner of electing school directors. 

I find by reference to this report that, during the year, 
I visited each of the 74 schools and 775 classes in the city 
at least once. During these short visits of from ten to 
twenty minutes I was able to give a few drill exercises in 



NATURE STUDY 249 

arithmetic for testing accuracy and quickness; to inquire 
about writing or drawing; and, in the higher grades, to 
question pupils about the kind of books they were reading 
at home. 

The order in the schools was, with very few exceptions, 
good. The yards were under strict supervision. Pupils 
filed into and out of the building with military precision, 
to the beat of a drum. The yard drill in free gymnastics 
was generally good, and in many cases excellent. The 
calisthenic drill in the classrooms was faithfully carried out. 
There were a few schools in which the discipline, it seemed 
to me, was carried to extremes. It is possible to have a 
discipline that represses activity and cheerfulness. A class 
in which a smile never dawns on the face of either teacher 
or pupil is over-disciplined. The hum of a beehive in 
open sunlight is preferable to the oppressive darkness and 
silence of an Egyptian temple. The best government pre- 
vails where the pleasant countenance of a cheerful teacher 
rises on the children at nine o'clock in the morning and 
beams upon them all day long. A Gatling-gun discharge of 
deportment checks by the teacher all day long, a continuous 
nagging of dull pupils, a multiplication of petty rules until 
a boy cannot wink his eye without a reprimand, everlasting 
faultfinding, never-ending scolding, depressing threats of 
failure to be promoted — these are not the best aids to 
cheerful obedience or to mental or moral development. 

I found that teachers, in general, had made a good be- 
ginning on the new course of study. In nature study the 
work was encouraging. Pupils ■ had begun to open their 
eyes to the world around them. The windows of the school- 
rooms were full of sprouting peas, beans, and corn. Draw- 
ings had been made of the successive stages of plant growth. 



250 CITY SUPERINTENDENT 

School cabinets had been begun and the children were 
eager to contribute specimens. Nearly every room had 
its glass jar of young tadpoles, and pupils were delighted 
with watching the metamorphosis of polliwogs into frogs. 
In the grammar grades the time given to arithmetic had 
been materially reduced, and methods had been simplified. 
In some schools intelligent work has been done in the study 
of grammar as applied to speaking and writing English. 
Under rational methods in drawing, so interested had the 
pupils become that in many classes they asked their teacher 
to allow them to remain after school to draw. The intro- 
duction of new and interesting reading books had greatly 
stimulated a taste for reading. Some of the schools were 
supplied with sets of primary histories of the United States, 
which were used as supplementary readers in the fourth, 
fifth, and sixth grades. Statistics show that one-half of the 
pupils leave school before completing the fifth grade. If 
such children learn anything about the history of our own 
country, that knowledge must be gained by supplementary 
reading in the lower grades. 

The leading aim in the new course was to make it flexible 
enough to allow the exercise of some individuality by both 
principals and teachers. In essentials there must be a 
general uniformity of studies, but a dead level of Chinese 
uniformity in details is the greatest of educational evils. 
Enthusiasm is the secret of success in teaching. Without 
some degree of freedom there can be neither enthusiasm nor 
earnestness. 

The vital part of my report for 1893 related to the method 
of electing teachers and to the office of "head inspector." 
It was an attack on certain abuses of power that had grown 
up by degrees in the department, and I realized in making 



v ABUSES OF POWER 251 

it that I should excite fierce antagonisms, which would in 
all probability defeat my renomination for the office of 
superintendent. The following extracts from this report 
will exhibit one of the evils that I attacked: 

The weakest point in our school system is the method of electing teachers. 
. . . It is an outgrowth of the "spoils system" in politics. It is contrary 
to all principles of civil reform. The number of new teachers to be elected 
is about thirty-six each year, or three appointments to each director. As 
places become vacant during the year, each director, in regular order, makes 
one appointment, and by mutual understanding this appointment is absolute, 
the only condition required being that the nominee must be the holder of a 
legal certificate. The names of appointees are handed to the chairman of 
the committee on classification, who makes the nominations in open board; 
consequently no one knows what director is responsible for the appointment 
of a teacher. Under this system no selection of the best teachers out of a 
large number of applicants is possible. The election of a teacher becomes 
merely the personal opinion or personal favoritism of one man. Young 
women who are graduates of the high school and normal school are reduced 
to a dead level with young girls who leave the grammar school and in a few 
months cram to pass an examination for a certificate. The most talented and 
accomplished teachers coming here from other cities stand no chance of an 
appointment on merit. School directors are subjected to the political or 
personal "pull" of United States senators, of governors and ex-governors, 
city officials, supervisors, members of county committees, political clubs, and 
active politicians generally. The present plan of appointments has become 
so strongly intrenched that there is little hope of a change except by the 
adoption of a new charter and a change in the manner of securing a board of 
education. 

It would be better if the board would agree to a rule requiring that all 
assistants in primary or grammar grades should be selected exclusively from 
the graduates of the City Normal School, the State Normal schools, the State 
University, or from experienced teachers elsewhere who have won a reputa- 
tion. The annual average of salaries paid to the teachers of this city is 
higher than in most large cities. While educated, trained, and experienced 
teachers are worth every dollar they are paid, untrained, unskilled, and poorly 
educated teachers do not earn such salaries. There is no good reason why 
any school director should appoint an unskilled, untrained, and inexperienced 
teacher, when twenty professionally trained teachers are waiting for posi- 
tions, and as many more experienced teachers that have won a reputation 
stand ready to fill a vacancy. It is sometimes urged that, as school directors 



252 CITY SUPERINTENDENT 

receive no salary for their services, they have the right to the personal pat- 
ronage of appointing their friends. But it seems to me that citizens who 
seek and secure such an office of honor have no moral right to prostitute their 
power to selfish and personal ends. 

For one year I managed to run along smoothly with the 
board, and then trouble arose. Seven members, a majority 
of the board, then addressed me a communication request- 
ing me to dismiss my deputy for reasons which I did not 
consider valid. As the deputy superintendent had dis- 
charged his duties faithfully and efficiently, I declined to 
remove him. The board then reduced his salary from $250 
a month to $25, hoping that he would resign. After three 
months the board rescinded its action and restored the 
salary. At the end of another year there was an election 
of school directors, at which one half of the old board was 
reelected, the other half being composed of new mem- 
bers. This board took the first steps in reform by con- 
solidating classes in accordance with the recommendations 
made in my second annual report, and in effecting other 
changes for the better. After the classes were filled up to 
a reasonable number, there were found to be sixty-three 
superfluous teachers who were temporarily retired, but who 
were all reinstated as vacancies occurred during the year. 

The Death of my Daughter Emily 

In April, 1892, our eldest daughter, Mrs. Emily Tracy 
(Swett) Parkhurst, lingered three weeks after her confine- 
ment, and then drifted away from life, leaving behind her 
an infant daughter. This loss was a crushing blow to us, 
and it was fortunate perhaps that the pressure of official 
duties kept me hard at work and thus enabled me better 
to endure my loss. Mr. Parkhurst committed the mother- 



EMILY TRACY (SWETT) PARKHURST 253 

less child to the loving care of my wife, and the little girl, 
Ruth Emilie Parkhurst, seems to us like one of our own 
children. At the time of her death Mrs. Parkhurst was 
twenty-nine years of age. She received her education in the 
public schools of San Francisco, and was graduated from 
the normal department of the Girls' High School in 1881. 
She early manifested a strong taste for literature. When 
sixteen years of age in the high school, she was one of seventy- 
five competitors for the prize of a gold watch and chain 
offered by the San Francisco Chronicle for the best Christmas 
story, and to her the prize was awarded. After her gradua- 
tion from the normal school, unable to find employment in 
the city school department, she accepted a position as 
teacher of music and French in a private seminary at 
Eureka in the northern part of California. She was a 
pleasing writer of both prose and verse, and in her literary 
work was often employed by publishers to translate French 
and German articles and books. She was at one time em- 
ployed as the private secretary of a publishing house, and 
in this capacity she developed executive ability of a high 
order. In 1889 she was married to John W. Parkhurst, an 
employee in the Bank of California, but she did not dis- 
continue her literary work. For a year before her death 
she was assistant editor of the Calif omian Illustrated 
Magazine, from which I quote the following tribute to her 
memory : 

The Pacific Coast world of letters has suffered a loss in the past month in 
the death of Emily Tracy (Swett) Parkhurst. Mrs. Parkhurst was con- 
nected with the Calif omian as an assistant editor, was a Contibutor to its 
columns, and wrote its literary reviews. She was a woman of rare promise, 
possessed of great talent, which, combined with executive ability, made her 
a prominent figure in many assemblies. Her especial work was the forma- 
tion of the Pacific Coast Women's Press Association. A few years ago she 



254 CITY SUPERINTENDENT 

traveled through the state and made the personal acquaintance of all the 
Pacific Coast writers, her object being to advance the interests of women 
writers — bring them out and aid them in obtaining a field for their work. 
In this she was extremely successful. She gathered about her hundreds of 
contributors to the literary press of the day, and finally organized the Press 
Association, of which she became secretary. The work thus accomplished 
did much in encouraging women to make a fight for themselves, and by her 
means many are now self-supporting who, previous to the movement, real- 
ized little or nothing from their literary work. Mrs. Parkhurst combined 
rare executive ability with literary discernment and taste, and was a brilliant 
organizer. At the time of her death, she had plans laid out for work that 
would have appalled many. One was a thorough investigation of the pos- 
sibility of woman's work in horticulture and agriculture in this state. This 
was not theory, as the plan included a system by which women could enter 
the lists with men in farming and marketing their products. Few women 
had so large an acquaintance; few will be missed by so great a number; and 
so a well- spent, bright life is ended, apparently cut short, yet leaving a rich 
heritage, a rare example to those who are left behind. 

Educational Progress 

A beginning of manual training was made in 1892 by 
organizing, in the commercial high school, classes in wood- 
work, architectural drawing, and freehand drawing. Two 
classes in cooking were established in grammar schools, and 
two in sewing. By resolution of the board, August 8, 1894, 
it was ordered that two additional classes in cooking should 
be established, and also three classes in manual training, 
for pupils in the higher grammar grades. 

The most notable educational work of the board of educa- 
tion during the year was a movement towards civil-service 
rules in the appointment of teachers. The rules adopted 
provided for the appointment, annually, to the " sub- 
stitute class" of the six graduates from the city normal 
school who stood highest in rank; for a competitive ex- 
amination to determine the election of twelve additional 
teachers; and for further vacancies. That such appoint- 



REMINISCENCES 255 

ments shall be made in the manner at present provided; but 
no one shall be appointed a teacher in the schools of this 
city who is not a graduate of some normal school, or other 
institution of learning of equal or higher rank, with a regu- 
lar diploma therefrom, or who shall not have had at least 
one year's successful practice in teaching in primary and 
grammar schools, and holding first-grade certificates. 

Political and Personal Reminiscences 

When, in my school report for 1892, I attacked the per- 
sonal and political system of electing teachers, I was well 
aware that I should antagonize the political bosses and the 
managers of ward politics. Consequently, when the time 
arrived in 1894 for the nomination of a school superin- 
tendent, I was not surprised to find some of the political 
managers of the Republican party bitterly opposed to me. 
Therefore, I made no effort to secure the nomination. 
However, on the urgent request of many friends, my name 
was proposed in the convention, but I had it withdrawn 
before the convention proceeded to make a nomination. 
I knew that the convention itself had no freedom of action 
in the matter, and that all the nominees were selected by 
the two political bosses in command of the party. In the 
following election, the Republican nominee was defeated 
by the candidate of the Democratic party, Andrew J. 
Moulder, my predecessor in the office of state superintend- 
ent. The politicians who defeated me were rebuked by 
the voice of the people. 

Before retiring from office, I delivered a final address at 
a teachers' institute meeting, and introduced my coming 
successor to the city teachers. This address closed with 
the following paragraphs: 



256 CITY SUPERINTENDENT 

Outside of the routine executive work of the office, the main points to 
which I have directed my efforts during my term of office for nearly four 
years may be summed up as follows: 

1. To secure in all the lower grades simple, thorough, and practical train- 
ing in reading, writing, and spelling our mother tongue; a thorough training 
in the essentials of arithmetic, while rigidly excluding the non-essentials that 
have been crammed into the textbooks; practice in simple, natural, and at- 
tractive exercises in freehand drawing; a business style of penmanship. - 

2. The introduction into the schools of sets of supplementary readers, 
and sets of good literary extracts from American authors, to supplement the 
state readers; the introduction into all grammar grades of sets of primary 
histories of our country as supplementary reading. 

3. The extension of the course in nature study or elementary science; 
moral training by means of talks on topics and the reading of extracts from 
the best books on this subject; training in politeness by means of talks on 
topics and of reading from special books on this subject. 

4. Frequent meetings of grade teachers and a free discussion of methods; 
teachers' institute meetings, with lectures by the ablest educators that could 
be secured. 

5. A 'course of study flexible enough to allow the exercise of some individ- 
uality in teaching, both to principals and class teachers. 

6. The establishment of classes in cooking; and the beginning of manual- 
training classes in grammar schools. 

As I am soon to retire from official connection with the schools at the 
expiration of my term of office, I wish here to return to the teachers in the 
school department my sincere thanks for their personal kindness and cour- 
tesy. Under the circumstances attending my election to office, four years 
ago, I should have been recreant to duty if I had not put my whole life 
into my official work. I may have made mistakes; I may not always have 
done the wisest thing under complicated conditions; but I have fearlessly 
done my duty as I understood it, without regard to personal consequences. 
I have stood by the teachers. I have defended many from unfair attacks. 
I have done my utmost to secure some method of appointing teachers 
better than that of personal favoritism or of political spoils. 

In taking leave of the nine hundred teachers in this city, some of whom 
have been personal friends and coworkers for many years, and nearly one 
half of whom were my pupils in the Girls' High and Normal School, I do so 
with regret, as my retirement from office, in all probability, marks the end 
of my lifework in teaching and in school supervision. 

I wish, also, on this occasion, to return my sincere thanks to the people of 
this city for their long-continued kindness to me, both in prosperity and in 



RETIREMENT 257 

adversity. Forty years ago, I came here a young man, friendless and un- 
known. Here T have devoted my youth, my manhood, and my advancing 
years to the public schools. 

As teacher, as state superintendent of public instruction, as city superin- 
tendent of public schools, I have put into my work all my enthusiasm and 
all my energy. I love the city of my adoption. I am proud of her schools. 
I have a profound faith that a good system of public schools is essential to 
the preservation of good government. The public schools must be made 
the nurseries of intelligent patriotism. They must be jealously guarded 
against attacks, and must be kept in line with the best of modern thought 
in education. I am thankful that it has been my privilege to aid in laying 
the foundation of the public-school system of this city and of California. 

After my retirement from office the election of teachers 
soon fell back into the old channels of personal and political 
"pull," and for several years the entire city government 
grew from bad to worse, until finally the better class of 
citizens succeeded in securing a new charter, which changed 
materially all departments of local government. The new 
charter provided for a board of education, appointed by 
the mayor, and paid a salary of three thousand dollars a 
year, each; also, for four deputy superintendents at a salary 
of eighteen hundred dollars a year, each. Civil-service 
rules were applied to a certain extent to the appointment 
of teachers. I have the satisfaction of feeling that my 
attacks on educational abuses contributed materially to 
this reform. 



CHAPTER XV 

OUTLINES OF THE CALIFORNIA PUBLIC-SCHOOL SYSTEM 

AS A WHOLE IN THE FIRST DECADE OF 

THE TWENTIETH CENTURY 

As these reminiscences began with a sketch of the com- 
mon schools and academies in New England, where I was 
born, it seems fitting that one of the closing chapters should 
contain a brief summary of the educational situation in 
California, which has been my home for half a century. 

At the beginning of this century all the omens are aus- 
picious. California is now at the high tide of prosperity 
in agriculture, in mining, in commerce, in the mechanic 
arts, and in all other industrial pursuits. Our whole public- 
school system, from primary schools to the State Univer- 
sity, is keeping even pace with our rapid increase in wealth, 
in population, in science, in art, and in literature. 

The California public-school system now consists of a 
free State University open to both young men and young 
women; of six State Normal schools; of nearly two hundred 
high schools; and underlying all these, as a broad founda- 
tion, an efficient system of common schools, or, in modern 
terms, elementary schools. 

The common schools of the state are under the executive 
control of the superintendent of public instruction. The 
state board of education is composed of ex-officio members 
as follows: the governor, the superintendent of public 
instruction, the president of the University of California, 
the president of each of the six State Normal schools, and 

258 



COUNTY AND CITY BOARDS OF EDUCATION 259 

the professor of pedagogy in the State University. This 
board is empowered to adopt rules and regulations not 
inconsistent with the state school law, and to prescribe by 
general rules the credentials upon which persons may be 
granted certificates to teach in high schools. 

County boards of education consist of the county 
superintendent and four other members appointed by the 
county board of supervisors. A majority of each board 
must consist of experienced teachers holding certificates 
not lower than of grammar grade. These boards are 
empowered to hold annual examinations of applicants for 
grammar-school certificates, valid for the county, and to 
issue kindergarten-primary certificates and special certifi- 
cates on credentials as prescribed by the state board. 

City boards of education are elected by popular vote, 
except in the city and county of San Francisco. The 
powers of city boards vary with the different city charters, 
subject to the general provision of the state school law. 

Each district board of school trustees consists of three 
members elected by popular vote at school district elections, 
for the term of three years, one member being elected each 
year. These boards are empowered to appoint teachers and 
fix their salaries; to appoint census marshals; to provide 
school supplies authorized by law; to keep the schoolhouses 
in repair, and to enforce the general provisions of the state 
school law. 

One of the most beneficent of many good provisions in 
the California school law is that relating to school libraries, 
incorporated into the "revised school law" in 1866, and 
retained, with slight amendments, on the statute books 
up to the present time. The number of volumes in all 
the school libraries in California in 1904 was reported 



260 THE CALIFORNIA PUBLIC-SCHOOL SYSTEM 

as 1,448,464. These books have been specially selected to 
suit the taste or the needs of young children. Thus, year 
by year, new books are added to the library. Every school 
in California, however small or however remote, has at 
least a few volumes of choice books used to cultivate in the 
pupils a taste for reading. The report of the state superin- 
tendent shows that for the school year ending June 30, 1904, 
a total of $138,439 was expended for school library books. 

School Revenue 

The school moneys, annually apportioned from the state 
treasury for the partial support of common schools, are 
derived from various sources. The securities held in trust 
by the state treasurer for the support of common schools 
consists of state funded debt bonds aggregating $1,726,500, 
together with bonds of various counties of the state, mak- 
ing a total of $4,847,650, the annual interest of which is 
applied to the support of schools. The amount derived 
from the state property tax of seven dollars per school- 
census child is about four millions of dollars. 

The second source of revenue is the county school tax, 
the minimum rate of which is six dollars per school census 
child. This tax gives a school revenue of over three millions 
of dollars. Another source of revenue is the city or district 
tax, which amounts to half a million dollars. The grand 
total of all receipts for school purposes is about twelve 
millions of dollars. 

It is said that Californians are giveri to boasting about 
their climate and their resources, but California teachers 
and educators make only the modest claim that their 
schools compare favorably with those of older, wealthier 
and more populous states that have a common school 



THE HIGH SCHOOLS 261 

history running back, for more than two hundred years, 
into the colonial period of the thirteen original states of 
the Union. The city schools in California closely resemble 
those in other states. The rural schools have some points 
of superiority over the corresponding rural schools in some 
of the older states, owing to the fact that the California 
school law provides that the county superintendent shall 
apportion outright five hundred dollars for each teacher in 
each school district. All remaining moneys are apportioned 
to districts in proportion to the average daily attendance. 
This direct appropriation of five hundred dollars a year for 
each teacher in the small, weak, or newly formed school 
districts, to which may be added from one hundred to 
three hundred dollars by pro rata apportionment on aver- 
age daily attendance, enables the small one-room rural 
schools to secure competent teachers, and continue school 
at least eight months in the year. The state, in turn, by 
means of a heavy state school tax, lends a helping hand to 
the weaker counties by compelling the cities, where wealth 
and population are concentrated, to aid the rural counties, 
which have a sparse population and a relatively smaller 
amount per capita of taxable property. This plan is re- 
garded by Californians as dictated by enlightened common 

sense. 

The High Schools 

In the early days of California, before the establishment 
of high schools, secondary education was provided for by 
numerous private, parochial, and denominational schools, 
under the name of college schools, " seminaries," "board- 
ing schools," and " academies," all of which were supported 
mainly by tuition fees. The first public high school opened 
its doors to both boys and girls, in San Francisco (1856), 



262 THE CALIFORNIA PUBLIC-SCHOOL SYSTEM 

under the name of The Union Grammar School, given 
to it out of deference to the objection of certain city officials, 
who contended that a high school did not constitute a legal 
part of the common-school system. Nevertheless, it was 
an English high school, sub rosa, with a course of study 
which included algebra, geometry, ancient and modern 
history, literature, physics, and chemistry. Two years 
later, official opinion had become enlightened enough to 
allow the school to assume the full-blown name of the 
San Francisco English High School. A few years later 
a Latin School was established "to fit boys for college." 
The second high school in California was opened in Sacra- 
mento (1859), and at a later date high schools were begun 
in Marysville, Grass Valley, Nevada City, Oakland, Los 
Angeles, San Jose, and Vallejo, in the order named. 

The opening of the State University of California (1870) 
stimulated the existing high schools. The upward pressure 
of the elementary schools, growing stronger and stronger, 
led to the passage of a state law (1891) whereby contiguous 
common-school districts could unite to form a union dis- 
trict and establish a union high school, and thereafter the 
number of high schools was rapidly increased. Authorized 
by an amendment to the constitution (1903), the state 
legislature levied an annual high-school tax of one and a 
half cents on each one hundred dollars of the state assess- 
ment roll, the proceeds to be distributed to aid in the 
local support of high schools. The first annual apportion- 
ment under this law amounted to $232,386. 

The state law of California requires a high standard of 
qualification for high school teachers. The power of grant- 
ing such certificates is vested exclusively in the state board 
of education, which issues certificates on credentials, the 



STATE NORMAL SCHOOLS 263 

standard being a university diploma, together with a 
certificate of having pursued the required pedagogical 
course in the University of California. The diploma of 
certain other universities of equal rank ' with the state 
university, and having also pedagogical courses, are recog- 
nized as the basis of credentials on which teachers' certifi- 
cates may be issued. 

State Normal Schools of California 

The first state normal school in California was opened in 
San Francisco, July 21, 1862, under an appropriation by 
the legislature of three thousand dollars for its support. 
This appropriation was secured by a volunteer committee 
consisting of Andrew J. Moulder, state superintendent 
of public instruction, George Tait, city superintendent of 
San Francisco, and myself, state superintendent elect. 
Dr. Hill, of Sonoma, a state senator, after long-continued 
persuasion, reluctantly consented to introduce our brief bill, 
which appropriated three thousand dollars, leaving the de- 
tails of organization to the state board of education, then 
consisting of the governor, the surveyor general, and the 
state superintendent. The school, in charge of Ahira 
Holmes, a graduate of the Massachusetts State Normal 
School at Bridgewater, opened in San Francisco with six 
pupils, just the number with which the first Massachu- 
setts State Normal School began. Its growth was slow, 
on account of the general indifference of the city school 
authorities and the hostility of a majority of public-school 
teachers. After my election to the office of state superin- 
tendent, the responsibility of looking after the school fell 
mainly on me for a period of five years. The city board of 
education reluctantly granted the school part of an old pri- 



264 THE CALIFORNIA PUBLIC-SCHOOL SYSTEM 

mary school building in the rear of the Lincoln Grammar 
School. A model or training school of two classes was soon 
opened, in charge of Miss Helen Clark from the Oswego 
Normal School. On account of the neglect and indiffer- 
ence of San Francisco, this pioneer normal school was 
removed to San Jose (187 1), where a suitable building 
was erected by the state. The five later state normal 
schools were established in the following order of time: 
Los Angeles (1882), Chico (1889), San Diego (1898), San 
Francisco (1899), Santa Barbara (1909). 

The standard of admission to these schools is the posses- 
sion of a certificate of graduation from an accredited high 
school, or of an equivalent education; the normal course, 
mainly professional, is completed in two years. A diploma 
of graduation from a California state normal school en- 
titles the holder to a life state certificate of the grammar 
grade. 

The Free State University of California 

Preceding the establishment of a state university in 
California, whatever there was in the way of the higher 
education was provided by various denominational colleges 
and college schools, such as the College of California 
at Oakland, the Santa Clara College at Santa Clara, and 
the St. Ignatius College in San Francisco, the University 
of the Pacific (Methodist) at Santa Clara, and a number 
of smaller college schools and seminaries. 

The College of California, an institution designed by 
its founders "to furnish the means of a thorough and com- 
prehensive education under the pervading influence and 
spirit of the Christian religion," began with a preparatory 
school at Oakland (1853) u - n der the name of the Oakland 



UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA 265 

College School, in charge of the Reverend Henry Durant 
and the Reverend I. H. Bray ton. In 1855 the College of 
California was incorporated, and in i860 was organized by 
the appointment of a faculty, of which the Reverend S. H. 
Willey was Vice-President, the Reverend I. H. Brayton, 
Professor of Rhetoric, Belles Lettres, and the English Lan- 
guage, and Reverend Henry Durant, the Professor in Greek 
and Literature. In 1866 trie number of students was thirty, 
and the number of professors, five. The total number of 
graduates up to 1866 was eight. 

In 1868, legislative action having become imperative in 
order to secure the congressional land grant for an agricul- 
tural college, John W. Dwindle, then a member of the state 
senate, introduced a bill which secured "a college of agri- 
culture and the mechanic arts." Meanwhile, the College 
of California, slow of growth, feeble in numbers, and en- 
cumbered with debt, was struggling for a precarious exist- 
ence. The friends and officers of this institution and a 
number of far-seeing men, among whom were ex-governor 
F. F. Low, John W. Dwindle, and the Reverend Samuel 
H. Willey, planned and carried into effect a consolidation 
of the College of California with the new-born State Uni- 
versity, by which the university board of regents assumed 
all debts of the college, and the college transferred to the 
university its students and its lands in Oakland and at 
Berkeley. It was a good bargain, both for the college and 
for the university. 

The University of California opened its doors (September 
23, 1869) in the old college building at Oakland, with an 
attendance of fifty students. Dr. John Le Conte, made 
acting president for a few months, was succeeded (1870) by 
the Reverend Henry Durant , who held the office until the 



266 THE CALIFORNIA PUBLIC-SCHOOL SYSTEM 

election of Daniel C. Gilman (1872). In 1873 the univer- 
sity was transferred to its permanent site at Berkeley, con- 
tiguous to Oakland. The full list of its presidents runs as 
follows: Henry Durant ('69-70); Daniel C. Gilman ('72); 
John Le Conte ('75), acting president; William T. Reid 
('81); Edward S. Holden ('85); Horace Davis ('88); Martin 
Kellogg ('93); Benjamin Ide Wheeler ('99 to date). 

In the beginning, the endowment of the university was 
small. From the sale of two townships (46,080 acres), 
reserved by the celebrated ordinance of 1787 a to be given 
perpetually for the purpose of a seminary of learning to be 
applied to the intended object by the legislature of the 
state," there was due from the state school fund $84,000 
ready money, about enough to pay the debts of the " Col- 
lege of California." The 150,000 acres of land granted by 
Congress in aid of a "college of agriculture and the me- 
chanic arts" constituted a fund of about $750,000, the 
interest of which could be applied to the university. The 
state soon appropriated from the sales of tide lands $800,000 
invested in bonds. For the rest, excepting a number of 
bequests for special purposes, the university has been 
supported by special appropriations by the legislature, and 
by an annual state tax of two cents on each one hundred 
dollars of the state assessment roll. Thus the university is 
in reality an integral part of the public-school system of the 
state. 

For the first twenty years the growth of the State Univer- 
sity was slow, but in 1884 the faculty, following the example 
of the University of Michigan, adopted the "accrediting 
system," by which high-school graduates are admitted to 
the university without examination. This action was fol- 
lowed by a rapid increase in attendance. The formation 



STANFORD UNIVERSITY 267 

of " union high schools," under the act of 1891, added to 
the number of students. In numbers, in organization, and 
in strength, the University of California ranks high among 
the great universities in the United States. It is open, 
without tuition fees, to men and to women on equal terms. 
Its curriculum, which includes various groups of elective 
studies, is broad enough to meet most of the demands of 
modern social and industrial conditions. 

The college of agriculture and the mechanic arts, reach- 
ing out in various directions includes horticulture, viti- 
culture, wheat growing, dairying, stock raising, and other 
highly specialized pursuits of country life. The strongly or- 
ganized pedagogical department, designated as the Depart- 
ment of Education, exerts a powerful influence upon the 
high schools and the teachers. The university has a flour- 
ishing college of mechanical engineering and mining, and a 
college of commerce. The college of letters is strong in 
history and literature, and in the ancient languages. The 
affiliated colleges of law and of medicine, located in San 
Francisco, constitute an important part of the university. 
The university "summer school" ranks high in numbers. 
The " university extension" lectures reach out to large 
numbers of people in various parts of the state. 

California is fortunate in having another great institution 
of learning, the Stanford University, founded and endowed 
by Mr. and Mrs. Leland Stanford (1890). Though not 
under direct state control, it fulfills many of the functions 
of a state university. It is open to both men and women; 
it has no tuition fees; it has a pedagogical department for 
the training of teachers; it has the elective system in studies; 
it has had from its beginning David Starr Jordan for its 
president. 



CHAPTER XVI 

THE PROFESSIONAL SPIRIT OF CALIFORNIA TEACHERS 

AS EXHIBITED IN STATE AND COUNTY 

TEACHERS' INSTITUTES 

The professional spirit of the teachers of California has 
been developed largely through the agency of state con- 
ventions, state teachers' institutes, state normal schools, 
county institutes, and the California Teachers' Association. 
Teachers' meetings for mutual improvement began to be 
held in the city of San Francisco, and early in 1854 the 
first state teachers' convention, called by state superintend- 
ent Paul K. Hubbs, met in San Francisco, December 6-8, 
1854. The attendance was small, and the most notable 
event of the session was the delivery of an eloquent ad- 
dress by Colonel Edward D. Baker, lawyer, soldier, and 
orator, who in his youthful days had taught a district 
school in Illinois. 

The first California State Teachers' Institute assembled 
in San Francisco, May 27 to June 1, 1861, under a call 
by the state superintendent, Andrew J. Moulder, who had 
secured from the legislature a small appropriation for the 
payment of necessary expenses. The program was well 
arranged, the attendance large, and the proceedings were 
interesting and instructive. 

The second state institute, which met in Sacramento, 
September, 1862, was called by Superintendent Moulder 
near the close of his second term of office. This meeting 
was small in numbers and the time was given up mainly 

268 



teachers' institutes 269 

to reports of committees and to discussion. The state 
board of examination, consisting of Superintendent Moul- 
der and six county superintendents, held an oral examina- 
tion of candidates for state certificates, which resulted in 
the granting of five grammar-school certificates, valid for 
two years, and twelve " mixed-school" certificates, valid 
for the same length of time. 

The third, fourth, and fifth institutes have been mentioned 
in previous chapters of this book. After 1865, no state 
appropriations were made for state institutes, and conse- 
quently, they grew weak and weaker, until they died out 
in 1875, when the state board of education called a con- 
vention of teachers which met at San Jose and organized a 
state teachers' association. 

This new organization maintained a lingering existence 
for a decade. Meanwhile the county teachers' institutes 
grew stronger under the state school law of 1863, which 
provided for an annual appropriation of at least $150 a 
year for each institute, made attendance compulsory, and 
required the school trustees to continue the salaries of 
teachers during institute week. Finally, two or more 
counties began to unite in joint institutes, and at length 
the county institutes began to affiliate with the state 
association, which grew large in numbers and strong in 
spirit. Next, the Southern California Teachers' Association 
came into existence, followed by a similar organization of 
the northern counties in the Sacramento Valley. The 
annual payment of a membership fee of one dollar has 
enabled all three of these teachers' associations to secure 
special lecturers from abroad and to publish a volume of 
proceedings. Within the last decade these associations 
have been reinforced by lecturers from the University of 



270 PROFESSIONAL SPIRIT OF CALIFORNIA TEACHERS 

California and from Stanford University, among whom are 
included Benjamin Ide Wheeler and David Starr Jordan. 

At the meeting in San Francisco (1903), fifteen hundred 
members were in attendance. The meeting in San Jose 
(1904), numbering twelve hundred members, was a combi- 
nation of four county institutes with the state association. 
The work of this meeting was carried on in many sections. 
Jacob Riis came from New York City to lecture on "The 
Battle with the Slums" and u The Making of an Amer- 
ican." W. H. Mills, of California, lectured on " Our Prison 
Schools," and Governor George C. Pardee, on " School 
Money" and the " Salaries of Teachers." It was a hard- 
working session of four days. 

At the Berkeley meeting, December 26-29, T 9°5> the P T0 ~ 
fessional spirit of California teachers appeared at its best. 
The county institutes of seventeen counties and the city 
institutes of five cities of San Francisco, Oakland, Stockton, 
Berkeley, and Alameda, were fused into the annual meeting 
of the California Teachers' Association under the wise and 
able leadership of President James A. Barr, city superin- 
tendent of the schools of Stockton. The State University 
buildings and grounds were thrown open to teachers. The 
organization of this great gathering was modeled after that 
of the National Educational Association. Two of the gen- 
eral sessions were held in the largest theater in San Fran- 
cisco, to accommodate the thousand teachers of that city, 
and two were held in the large auditorium of the university 
at Berkeley. .The section work filled every available lecture 
room in Berkeley. The proceedings were published in a 
volume of 545 pages. 

It was one of my cherished illusions, half a century ago, 
that there might be, in the far-distant future, a time when 



STATE TEACHERS' ASSOCIATION 271 

teaching would be regarded as a profession, and that 
teachers might combine and grow strong. At this Berkeley 
meeting my wildest dreams were realized. 1 

At the annual meeting at San Jose, 1908, the association 
amended its constitution, elected L. E. Armstrong as sec- 
retary, and took over the Sierra Educational News as its 
official organ for the publication of proceedings. 

The annual meeting, held in San Francisco, December 
27-30, 1909, was a combination of the California Teachers' 
Association with the county institutes of San Francisco, 

x It seems fitting in this connection to quote the words of one of the fore- 
most of California teachers, himself an embodiment of professional spirit. 
They were written as a leading editorial in the Western Journal of Educa- 
tion by Dr. C. C. Van Liew, President of the Chico State Normal School. 

"But the greatest achievement of the year was the work of President Barr 
in preparing for the Berkeley meeting of the State Teachers' Association. 
Such an awakening of the teaching force of the state as he has occasioned 
is bound to be historic; the year will long be known as the great year. . . . 

"The unique success of the week, among departments, was unquestion- 
ably achieved by the Farmers' Institute. It is certainly significant that 
agricultural education appealed to a greater variety of people than any other 
line of educational work. The great attraction here was the address of Dr. 
A. C. True, director of experimental stations of the United States Depart- 
ment of Agriculture, and chairman of the committee on methods of teach- 
ins: agriculture of the Association of American Colleges and Experimental 
Stations. . . . 

"Not the least interesting on this program was the address of John Swett, 
whose direct questions, both to farmers and to teachers, were welcomed be- 
cause they showed how simply some very effective things might be accom- 
plished. . . . 

"And in this state we have a schoolmaster whose service was one of devo- 
tion to all the good purposes of the teachers. It is a great thing to have 
achieved the right to retire from active service with a strong, clear record, 
and to remain the inspiration of fellow workers. The capsheaf of the Berk- 
eley meeting was the John Swett evening in Hearst Hall. It was not the 
addresses there made, but the thing that was done, the presentation of Mrs. 
Richardson's fine portrait of John Swett to the University of California, by 
the teachers of California, that was significant. Let us not forget that." 



272 PROFESSIONAL SPIRIT OF CALIFORNIA TEACHERS 

Alameda, Sonoma, Contra Costa, and Marin. The pro- 
gram was wisely and thoughtfully prepared, and the great 
gathering of the clans represented the high-water mark of 
professional spirit. The general sessions filled to overflow- 
ing the great Dreamland Pavilion in which the meetings 
were held. 

The " section" meetings included in their varied programs 
the following topics: kindergartens, elementary schools, 
high schools, nature study, drawing, music, short stories, 
manual arts, manual training, English, the classics, history, 
science, and mathematics. The addresses and discussions 
in these numerous sections, or "round tables," showed that, 
during the past decade, the teachers, both men and women, 
have been learning the value and power of educational 
"team work." 

At the first general session President E. Morris Cox read 
his annual message, a lengthy document full of wise sug- 
gestions and thoughtful recommendations. In his easy, 
offhand manner, Dr. Luther H. Gulick, of New York, spoke 
on the subject of "What Play Means in Education." I have 
been in attendance at meetings of teachers in California ever 
since the first state convention in 1854, and I am free to say 
that I never heard a more delightful lecture than this talk 
by Dr. Gulick. 

Allison Ware, from the faculty of the San Francisco 
State Normal School, next addressed the meeting in stirring 
words worthy of his high reputation as an institute lecturer. 

Then Dr. George E. Vincent, from the University of 
Chicago, spoke on "The New Duty of the School." He is 
a popular platform orator who speaks at the rate of three 
hundred words a minute, and compels reporters to lay down 
their pencils in despair. 



A VOLUNTEER PRIVATE 273 

The social side of this great meeting was delightful. The 
women teachers of San Francisco gave a reception to the 
state teachers at the Palace Hotel. The Women's Club 
gave a reception at the Fairmont Hotel. The School- 
masters' Club held its quarterly meeting. Various other 
clubs and organizations met in school gatherings. As the 
climax of this great meeting, at the annual election of officers, 
Dr. A. F. Lange of the University of California was chosen 
as president, and a central representative council was elected 
to look after school legislation in the state legislature. 
Though retired from active service, I hold myself as a 
volunteer private in the ranks, keeping step with the 
advance guard of educational reformers. 



CHAPTER XVII 

MY PILGRIMAGE TO NEW ENGLAND IN QUEST OF EARLY 

TOWN RECORDS RELATING TO THE BEGINNINGS 

OF COMMON SCHOOLS 

In the summer and autumn of 1898 I enjoyed the longest 
and pleasantest vacation of my life. Starting East by way 
of the Canadian Pacific Railway, I caught glimpses of 
mountain scenery so wild and grand that I have longed ever 
since to repeat the trip. In Boston I met Dr. A. E. Win- 
ship, editor of the weekly national Journal of Education, 
and also a popular lecturer at teachers' institutes, person- 
ally known to more American teachers than is any other 
living educator in the United States; George H. Martin, 
the able secretary of the Massachusetts state board of 
education; Professor Paul H. Hanus of Harvard; Honor- 
able John Conness, formerly United States Senator from 
California, residing near Boston; and Walter H. Page, at 
that time editor of the Atlantic Monthly, now editor of 
the World's Work. 

Hearing that Dr. A. D. Mayo was passing the summer 
months in Boston, I hunted him up and secured a room in 
the large boarding house where, surrounded by his library, 
he was busily engaged in writing a history of the American 
system of public schools. We became friends at once. He 
was at work eight hours a day, but his evenings and Sun- 
days he devoted to me. My days were occupied in making 
a study of Boston and in visits to the state library. For 
three weeks I lingered there, a willing pupil at the feet of 

274 




John Swett in 1900 



27S 



276 PILGRIMAGE TO NEW ENGLAND 

the great master, who had been personally acquainted with 
many prominent educators such as Mann, Barnard, Harris, 
and White; with clergymen such as Emerson, Channing, 
Edward Everett Hale, and Theodore Parker; with writers 
such as Holmes, Whittier, Longfellow, and Lowell; with 
political speakers like Webster, Choate, Seward, and 
Abraham Lincoln; with lecturers like Wendell Phillips and 
Edward Everett. Himself a popular lecturer as well as a 
distinguished clergyman, he gave up the pulpit, and, im- 
pelled by a sense of patriotic duty, became for seventeen 
years an educational missionary in the states of the South 
devoting himself to his work with the zeal of Horace Mann, 
the genial earnestness of Starr King, and the outspoken 
boldness of Theodore Parker. 

When I met him in Boston his missionary work was nearly 
over, and he was busily engaged in writing an additional 
chapter of his history of the common-school system of the 
United States. The chapters of this work published in the 
annual reports of the United States Commissioner of 
Education from 1894 to 1902, run as follows: 

I. Colonial Common Schools. Report for 1894. 
II. Education in the Northwest. Report for 1895. 

III. School Systems in the North Atlantic States, 1830 to 

1865. Report for 1896. 

IV. Horace Mann and the Great Revival of 1830 to 1850. 

Report for 1897. 

V. Common Schools in New York, New Jersey, and 
Pennsylvania. Report for 1898. 

VI. Developments in the Western States, 1830 to i860. 
Report for 1899. 



MY BOYHOOD HOME REVISITED 277 

VII. Establishment of the American Common School 
System in North Carolina, South Carolina, and 
Georgia, 1863. Report for 1900. 

VIII. Schools in the Central States of the South, 1830 to 
i860. Report for 1901. 

Dr. Mayo died suddenly in the city of Washington, in 
April, 1907, leaving his great work unfinished. 

When my evening school with Dr. Mayo was over, I 
turned to my native state and made my headquarters for 
a time at the hospitable home of my cousin, John C. French, 
in Manchester, the great business center of New Hampshire. 
Mr. French took an interest in the history of his native state, 
and I found in his library many volumes of town histories 
and other historical documents. Then we went together 
to our native town of Pittsfield, and I made my head- 
quarters at his summer home, on the farm where I had 
worked as a " hired hand" in the spring and summer 
of 1848. 

I rambled all over the little town, through old crossroads 
half overgrown with trees, and along the banks of the Sun- 
cook River where I had so often gone a-fishing when a boy, 
and where now there runs a branch of the Boston and Maine 
Railroad. Then I climbed to the summit of Catamount 
and studied the deep grooves on its bald granite crown which 
showed the marks left by the great ice sheet that covered 
all New England during the glacial period. I stood on the 
very spot where, forty-six years before, I had taken a fare- 
well view of my native state as I was about to start for 
California. Day after day I lingered around that mountain, 
recalling slumbering memories of the past. I became im- 
pressed by the relatively large number of teachers and 



278 PILGRIMAGE TO NEW ENGLAND 

educators, born and bred on the hill farms of New Hamp- 
shire, who began their education in the common school, 
continued it in rural academies, and perhaps in Dartmouth 
College, and then started out to seek their fortunes in the 
larger and richer states of the West. 

New Hampshire is a small state, having an area of about 
seven thousand square miles, subdivided into over three 
hundred small towns (townships) and into several thousand 
small farms. Its population in round numbers at the 
present time is only 400,000. According to the census 
taken by order of Congress in 1790, the population of 
New Hampshire was 141,985; of Massachusetts, 378,787. 

The rough lean soil of the " Granite State" is hard to till. 
The winter climate is harsh and cold. The early settlers, 
before the development of manufactures of various kinds, 
had a hard struggle to earn a frugal living. The small 
farms could not be subdivided, and if there were several 
boys in the family, only one could remain on the home farm 
and the others were forced to push out into the world to 
earn a living. To all boys the common school opened the 
gates of opportunity to make a fair start in life. 

In the early colonial days, New Hampshire, in comparison 
with other New England states, ranked relatively higher 
in population and influence than it does at the present time. 
Therefore I have gathered up the names of men who made 
their mark, at home or abroad, in the early history of the 
state. My original notes, jotted down on the spot, have 
been filled out, verified, and put into the form of a mono- 
graph study on the far-reaching influence of the American 
common school in New England, the spot of its origin. 



NEW HAMPSHIRE BOYS 279 

A Few New Hampshire Boys 

Standing on the summit of Catamount and turning my 
eyes southward, I looked down on Deerfield, the birthplace 
of John D. Philbrick, the distinguished educator who was 
so long superintendent of the Boston public schools. I 
remember him with gratitude for his encouragement of my 
work in California, for many valuable Boston educational 
reports, and for two delightful days passed with him in 
visiting the Boston schools. 

Here was born Lorenzo D. Harvey, teacher and educator, 
who at an early age was taken out West by his father and 
mother. He grew up to become state superintendent of 
schools in Wisconsin, a distinguished lecturer on " Indus- 
trial Training in the Public Schools," and a manager of the 
Stout schools of Menominee. 

Benjamin F. Butler, lawyer, soldier, and politician, was 
born in this town. His father, John Butler, served as a 
captain of dragoons under General Andrew Jackson at New 
Orleans. His mother was a descendant of the Cilleys, a 
New Hampshire family of Scotch-Irish blood. Captain 
Butler was engaged in trade with the West Indies, where 
he died in 18 19, when Benjamin was one year old. His 
widow, a woman of great force of character, sent her two 
boys to the common schools in Deerfield as soon as they 
were old enough to go. Ambitious to give Ben a good 
education, she removed (1828) to the city of Lowell, Massa- 
chusetts, where she increased her scanty means by taking 
boarders, and managed to keep her son at school until he 
was fitted to enter Waterville College. After his college 
course he studied law, teaching school a part of his time to 
help pay his expenses. 



280 PILGRIMAGE TO NEW ENGLAND 

Contiguous to Pittsfield on the south there lies the small 
town of Epsom, where I could see Sanborn Hill, on which 
was born General John B. Sanborn, whose ancestors dwelt 
in Old Hampton. He began his education in the common 
school, supplemented it by hard work on a hill farm, con- 
tinued it at Pembroke Academy, in Dartmouth College, 
and in a law office. Then he went West to St. Paul, 
Minnesota. On Sanborn Hill there was also born Walter 
Sanborn, nephew of John B. Sanborn, who emigrated to 
Minnesota, and became judge of the United States Circuit 
Court. In Epsom was born Enoch Eastman, my much- 
loved teacher when I was a boy in a Pittsfield school. He 
went out West to practice law, and during the Civil War 
became lieutenant governor of Iowa. In Epsom was born 
Andrew McCleary, Scotch-Irish by descent, who served as 
major in Stark's regiment of New Hampshire militia. 
Major McCleary reached Cambridge just in season to join 
his regiment on the morning of the battle of Bunker Hill. 
While marching across Cambridge neck, which was raked 
by the fire of the British war vessels, he was struck dead 
by a cannon ball which carried away his head. 

Facing northward I looked down on the town of Loudon, 
where was born Frank French, the artist, who delights to 
picture New Hampshire scenery though he makes his home 
in the city of New York 1 . In Loudon was born Joseph C. 
Morrill, who emigrated to California with me, became a 
teacher in San Francisco, and then, during the Civil War, 
a captain in Colonel Connor's regiment of volunteers. 

At my feet lay Pittsfield village and town. I could see 
the Drake-Swett homestead, which has passed into the 
hands of strangers; the Abraham French homestead, like- 
wise occupied by strangers; the homestead of Colonel 



THE BERRY BOYS 28 1 

Nathaniel Batchelder, from which the whole family emi- 
grated to Illinois; the White homestead, from which the 
whole family removed to California; the Elliott homestead, 
from which two sons also went to California; the John 
Jenness homestead, which sent one son to California. 

I looked down on the homestead where was born Nehe- 
miah C. Berry, a farmer boy, educated in the common 
school, Pittsfield Academy, and Dartmouth College. He 
was principal of the Pittsfield Academy for one year, after 
which he studied law and established a law office in Boston. 
From the same homestead his brother, Jonathan Berry, 
married my cousin Harriet Berry, and moved to Illinois. 
On the slope of Catamount, in Dowborough, was born 
John H. Prescott, educated in common school and academy, 
who served as captain in the Civil War, studied law, and 
went to Kansas, where he became a leading judge. On the 
slope of Jenness hill, I could distinguish the Norris home- 
stead, where was born Moses Norris, a leading lawyer in 
New Hampshire, and a senator of the United States. 

High up on the slope of Catamount, as near to the summit 
as it was possible to clear a rocky farm, was built the stately 
old farmhouse of Major William Berry, one of the early 
settlers of the town. In that house he reared a sturdy 
family of eleven children, among whom was my stepfather 
and guardian, William Berry, Jr. Another of his sons, 
John Berry, built a fine house in Pittsfield village and kept 
a country store. John Berry's e dest boy, John M. Berry, 
educated in the common school, Pittsfield Academy, and 
Dartmouth College, studied law, went to Minnesota and 
became a judge of the State Supreme Court. Another of 
his sons enlisted as a private in the Civil War and served 
through the war, 



282 PILGRIMAGE TO NEW ENGLAND 

A Sturdy Barrtngton Boy 

Southeast from Pittsfield, ten or twelve miles over a hill 
road, there lies the town of Barrington, where was born 
(1815) a New Hampshire boy whose grit is worth record- 
ing. Up to fifteen years of age he worked hard on a rocky 
hill farm on which his father was vainly trying to pay off a 
mortgage of one hundred and fifty dollars. He went to the 
district school about two months in each winter. Then John 
Perry, Jr., spoke up and said: "Father, I want you to let 
me go to Boston, where I think I can earn some money to 
pay off the mortgage on the farm." Reluctantly his father 
consented, and off this daring boy started on foot for 
Boston, eighty miles away, with only twenty-five cents in 
his pocket and with no clothes except the homespun suit he 
wore on his back. It was in the month of March, and the 
roads were heavy with melting snow and ice, but he made 
fifteen miles the first day, and found lodging and supper in 
a farmhouse. 

Next day, as he trudged along, footsore and weary, a 
farmer overtook him and said: "My boy, where are you 
going?" < 

"I am going to Boston to earn some money to pay off 
the mortgage on my father's farm." 

"Well, you look about tuckered out. You get right into 
my wagon and ride home with me, and stay all night. 
To-morrow I'll see what I can do for you." 

Next day the old farmer took him to see the minister, 
who wanted a steady boy to take care of his horse and to 
work in his garden. John Perry secured his first job for 
four months at eight dollars a month. Then the good old 
minister told him he had better go to school for four months, 



JOHN PERRY, JR. 283 

and to school he went, where "he finished up" all the school 
education he ever got. Finally he reached the Mecca of 
his pilgrimage two years after he started from home. On 
the streets of Boston, as he wandered around looking for 
something to do, he came across a broker who said that he 
wanted a messenger boy. He filled the bill so well that he 
was soon taken into partnership in the brokerage business. 
In less than five years he sent one hundred and fifty dol- 
lars to his father to pay off the mortgage on the old home- 
stead. In 1836 he considered himself worth $25,000; but 
the great financial panic of 1837 swept away his stocks, 
bonds, and possessions. Nothing daunted, he resumed 
business, with no capital except a good reputation, and was 
again successful. 

I first saw this persistent New Hampshire boy in the city 
of San Francisco (1855), when he was a member of the 
board of assistant aldermen, and I was a young public- 
school teacher. In 1906, just half a century later, he was 
in active business as a broker, and could be seen bustling 
about the streets and banks with the elastic step of a young 
man, notwithstanding his advanced age. He was for many 
years the most picturesque business man in San Francisco, 
distinguished for honor, honesty, integrity, and by a char- 
acter above reproach. I met him one evening at a meeting 
of the members of the Mercantile Library and said to him : 
" John Perry, Jr., tell me where you discovered the fountain 
of perpetual youth?" His reply was, "On a rocky little 
farm in the town of Barrington." "Why, that town," said 
I, "is only ten miles distant from the rocky little farm in 
Pittsfield on which I was born. Let us shake hands again;" 
and then he told me in substance the story which I have 
here given. A group of members gathered around us as we 



284 PILGRIMAGE TO NEW ENGLAND 

talked, and a white-haired boy, seventy-five years old, 
broke out with, "Take me into your circle; I, too, was born 
on a rocky little farm in the Old Granite State. New 
Hampshire is a good state to emigrate from." 

Thirty days after the earthquake and fire in 1906, John 
Perry, Jr. , was attending to his regular business as a broker, 
but his step was less elastic. A year later he died, in June, 
1907, at ninety- two years of age. 

The Hampton Seacoast Region 

Far away to the southeast, where on a clear day, with a 
good glass, the glimmer of the Atlantic can be seen from 
the summit of Catamount, lies the seaside town of old 
Hampton, in which, or near which, lived my paternal and 
maternal ancestors. In Hampton Falls was born Franklin 
B. Sanborn, author, journalist, and one of the Concord 
School of Philosophers. In Hampton was born Aaron 
Gove, a lineal descendant, in the seventh generation, of 
Edward Gove, one of the early settlers. At three years of 
age he entered the district school, which, like its prototype in 
1649, kept its doors open "to all children of the towne both 
mayle and femaile." In that school he remained four years, 
until he was transferred to Hampton Academy. Like thou- 
sands of other New England boys, he went "out West," 
where he became the able and clear-headed superintendent 
of public schools in the city of Denver, Colorado, for a 
period of twenty-five years. In North Hampton was born 
Henry Deerborn, physician, soldier, and congressman, who 
was captain in Colonel John Stark's regiment at Bunker 
Hill, and an officer in Arnold's expedition through the Maine 
wilderness against Quebec. 

In this section of New Hampshire lies Bedford, the birth- 



THE HAMPTON SEACOAST REGION 285 

place of Colonel Francis W. Parker, the evangelist of ad- 
vanced ideas about elementary teaching, who preached the 
educational gospel of training young children how to observe 
and how to think. Born and bred on a farm, educated in 
common school and academy, he became a teacher, a soldier 
in the Civil War, an educator, a lecturer, a school superin- 
tendent, and principal of the Chicago Normal School. This 
town claims as a native son Zachariah Chandler, United 
States senator from Michigan during the Civil War, notable 
as one of the uncompromising leaders of the Republican 
party. 

In this same region, in the town of Epping, there was 
born and bred on a rocky farm a boy named David P. Page, 
whose name is known to all American teachers as the author 
of Page's " Theory and Practice of Teaching." He was the 
first principal of the first state normal school in the state of 
New York. He died early in life, a martyr to overwork in 
building up the Albany Normal School. In Epping was 
born another farmer boy named Benjamin F. Prescott, 
whose father sent him to the common school, then to Pem- 
broke Academy, and next to Dartmouth College. He be- 
came a journalist, a lawyer, a farmer, and governor of his 
native state. In Lee was born Ira G. Hoitt, another farmer 
boy, who fitted for college at Phillips-Exeter Academy, 
worked his way through Dartmouth College, and then went 
West to become a public-school teacher in San Francisco, 
and state superintendent of schools in California. 

The historic town of Exeter, famous for the Phillips- 
Exeter Academy, claims, by birthright, the sculptor, Daniel 
Chester French. Exeter claims Dudley Leavitt, school- 
master, editor, and almanac maker, known as "Old Master 
Leavitt," whose almanacs were long found hanging by a 



286 PILGRIMAGE TO NEW ENGLAND 

string in most of the farmhouses in New England. Lewis 
Cass was born in Exeter and educated in Phillips-Exeter 
Academy. His father, an army officer, was ordered out 
West when his son was seventeen years old, and Lewis 
became an adopted son of Michigan, where he studied law, 
made his way in the world, became secretary of war under 
Andrew Jackson, and held other official positions. He was 
the defeated Democratic candidate for President of the 
United States in 1848. 

In Nottingham, a few miles from Exeter, was born 
Bradbury L. Cilley, the eldest of the nine children of Joseph 
L. Cilley. He fitted for college in Phillips-Exeter Academy 
and was graduated from Harvard. Soon after his gradua- 
tion he was elected professor of Greek and Latin in Phillips- 
Exeter Academy, in which position he remained for forty 
years, honored and beloved by his pupils. It was a relative 
of this great teacher, Mrs. Martha (Cilley) Berry, a resident 
of Pittsfield, that lent me a complete file of the New York 
Knickerbocker Magazine, for which favor I am grateful to 
this day. 

Of the Cilley family, the first Joseph Cilley, a soldier and 
lawyer, was one of the early settlers in Nottingham (1728), 
whose education was limited to farm life, the common school, 
and home study of law. He served during the Revolu- 
tionary War as colonel of a New Hampshire regiment, and 
was engaged in the battles of Monmouth, Saratoga, and 
the storming of Stony Point under Wayne. 

In the town of South Newmarket was born John W. Lane, 
who attended the common school until he was apprenticed 
to learn the trade of house carpenter. His apprenticeship 
over, he earned money to pay for his attendance at several 
academies. Slowly but surely he fitted himself for college, 



OTHER NEW HAMPSHIRE BOYS 287 

and finally was graduated from Amherst. He taught 
school, studied theology at Andover, and became a Con- 
gregational minister. At eighty-five years of age he is the 
efficient pastor of a small church at North Hadley, Massa- 
chusetts. He studied elocution under Professor William 
Russell, and for many years trained students in elocution 
at Amherst College. 

In Westmoreland was born Thomas Sherwin, teacher 
and schoolbook author, who was head master of the Boston 
high school for boys for thirty-one years (1838-69). 

In Durham was born James F. Joy, whose father was agent 
of the Pittsfield cotton factory when I was a boy. James 
was sent to the common school, to Pittsfield Academy, and 
to Dartmouth College. He taught school, studied law, 
went West,, and in Michigan became a millionaire and the 
legal adviser of the Michigan Central Railway. 

In 1774 Durham was the home of John Sullivan, son of 
"Schoolmaster Sullivan," and Alexander Scammel was a 
law student in Sullivan's office. Both of these young 
patriots were destined to become notable leaders in the war 
for independence. 

On the 13th day of December, 1774, Paul Revere, 
riding posthaste from Boston, brought letters to the 
Committee of Safety at Portsmouth stating that General 
Gage was on the point of sending, by sea, a detach- 
ment of British troops to reinforce the small garrison at 
Fort William and Mary that commanded Portsmouth 
Harbor. Revere also brought a strong appeal for powder. 
The militia of Portsmouth mustered under arms, and on 
December 14th proceeded to the fort, only two miles dis- 
tant, overpowered and disarmed the feeble garrison without 
bloodshed, broke open the magazine, carried off one hun- 



288 PILGRIMAGE TO NEW ENGLAND 

dred barrels of powder and placed them in the care of 
the Committee of Safety at Portsmouth. On December 
15th, as soon as the news reached Durham, Captain John 
Sullivan and Alexander Scammell immediately summoned 
an armed force of about twenty men and at night dropped 
down Oyster River to Portsmouth, took a few more men on 
board their " Gondola," proceeded to the fort, and took off 
fifteen four-pounders, one nine-pounder, all the small arms, 
and a quantity of cannon balls, all of which they placed 
in the hands of the Committee of Safety. 1 

Four months after these stirring events, the " minute 
men" of Massachusetts met a detachment of British troops 
at Concord and Lexington and drove them back to Boston. 
When the news of these battles reached John Stark at work 
in his sawmill at Londonderry, he instantly mounted his 
horse, spread the tidings to his townsmen, telling them 
to take every ounce of their ammunition with them and 
to follow him to the camp at Cambridge. It is said 
that every able-bodied man, except two, responded to his 
call. 

On the morning of the eventful day of the battle of Bun- 
ker Hill, Colonel John Stark's regiment, the largest and 
best equipped in camp, was ordered to reinforce the militia 
occupying the redoubt thrown up on Breeds Hill. Stark's 
sharp military eye took in the situation at a glance. He 
marched his men to a gap in the American line between the 
redoubt and Mystic River only partly filled by a small 
Connecticut regiment under Colonel Knowlton. There, 

1 According to the official reports the captured powder was distributed as 
follows: Exeter, twenty-nine barrels; Kingston, twelve barrels; Epping and 
Nottingham, eight barrels each; Brentwood, six barrels; and Londonderry, 
the home of Colonel John Stark, one barrel. See Manchester Historic 
Association Collection, Vol. 1, Part 1, 1896. 



THE MOUNT MONADNOCK REGION 2S9 

behind a stone wall and a rail fence which his men filled 
with new-mown hay, he formed his line of battle. 

When the Welsh Fusileers, one of Gage's picked regi- 
ments, made a flank attack on the American line, they were 
almost annihilated by the deadly fire of Stark's men, most 
of whom were expert marksmen trained to the use of both 
rifle and musket. In this battle none of the Americans were 
equipped with bayonets, and when the British made the 
final charge which carried the redoubt, the Americans, 
having exhausted their ammunition, fought only with 
clubbed muskets. Thanks to the foresight of Stark, his 
men had a reserve of powder and bullets, and they formed 
the rear guard of the retreating militia, protecting them 
from the bayonets of the pursuing enemy. 

The ancient seaport town of Portsmouth claims as her 
native sons James T. Fields, publisher and author; Thomas 
Bailey Aldrich, poet and author; John Wentworth, the last 
royal governor of New Hampshire ; John Langdon, congress- 
man, soldier, governor, and United States senator; Wood- 
bury Langdon, lawyer, jurist, and judge of the Supreme 
Court of New Hampshire; and Dr. John Lord, clergyman, 
author, and lecturer on history. 

The Mount Monadnock Region 

Into the southwestern corner of New Hampshire there 
is crowded the small town of Hinsdale, the birthplace of 
Charles A. Dana, the great journalist of the New York 
Sun, and of Elisha Benjamin Andrews, the distinguished 
educator and university president, formerly of Brown and 
afterwards of Nebraska University. There are many in- 
teresting towns grouped around Mount Monadnock, the 
most striking landmark of this region. 



290 PILGRIMAGE TO NEW ENGLAND 

In the rural town of Amherst the traveler can find the 
worn-out farm on which was born Horace Greeley, the 
founder of the New York Tribune. In the district school of 
his native town, this boy of Scotch-Irish blood picked up 
all the school education that he ever got; but, like Benjamin 
Franklin, he finished off his education in a printing office 
into which he was driven by his father's poverty. 

Isaac Hill, though born in Massachusetts, was an adopted 
New Hampshire boy. At fourteen years of age he entered 
the office of the Farmers' Cabinet, a weekly paper at 
Amherst, N. H., as an apprentice to learn the art of type- 
setting. He had bee,n born to poverty, but like Horace 
Greeley, had picked up a limited knowledge of reading, 
writing, and arithmetic by attending the common schools. 
While serving his seven years of apprenticeship, he con- 
tinued his education by reading all the books'that he could 
get hold of. At twenty-one years of age he left Amherst 
with a capital of one dollar in his pocket, and assumed charge 
of the American Patriot, a weekly paper, at Concord, the 
state capital. He soon became the owner of this sheet, 
and changed its name to the New Hampshire Patriot, the 
paper that I read with lively interest when a boy. It is 
needless to state that he made his journal intensely demo- 
cratic and aggressive in tone. 

Hill made so brilliant a campaign in favor of President 
Jackson that he was appointed to the second comptroller- 
ship of the treasury, which carried with it a salary of three 
thousand dollars and the gift of ten clerkships. The senate 
refused to confirm Hill's appointment. Then Levi Wood- 
bury, senator from New Hampshire, resigned for the purpose 
of making a vacancy, which the New Hampshire legislature 
filled by the election of Isaac Hill to the vacant seat. Levi 



OTHER NEW HAMPSHIRE BOYS 29 1 

Woodbury was held in reserve for appointment in Jackson's 
Cabinet. Isaac Hill was not only an incisive editorial 
writer and a clear-headed politician, but he was also a 
successful business man. He kept a bookstore, published 
books, and managed a good farm. 

It was in this part of the valley of the Merrimac that in 
1 719 about a hundred families of Scotch-Irish Presbyterians 
from Londonderry, Ireland, made a settlement which they 
named in memory of their home over sea. By trade they 
were mostly spinners and weavers of linen, and in their new 
homes they set up their looms and spinning wheels and 
began raising flax, thus introducing into New Hampshire a 
new form o domestic industry. In this town was born 
John Stark, Scotch-Irish by descent, who gained his educa- 
tion in a district school and grew up to become the ablest 
military commander in his native state during the Revo- 
lutionary War. Here was born Samuel Bell, of Scotch-Irish 
descent, lawyer, governor, legislator, and United States 
senator from New Hampshire. His brother, John Bell, was 
elected governor in 1830. In Londonderry was born a 
farmer boy of Scotch-Irish stock, Samuel Harvey Taylor, 
a famous teacher, who was principal of Phillips-Exeter 
Academy from 1837 to 187 1. He died in his classroom. 

Peterborough, in this same section, is the birthplace of 
Jeremiah Smith, Scotch-Irish by descent, one of New 
Hampshire's most distinguished lawyers and jurists. Here 
too was born General James Miller, who won honor in the 
battle of Lundy's Lane in the year of 181 2. This is the 
town that by vote in town meeting, in 1833, laid the foun- 
dation of a free public library supported by town tax, the 
first in New Hampshire, and one of the first of its kind in 
the United States. 



292 PILGRIMAGE TO NEW ENGLAND 

In the town of Winchester, bordering on Massachusetts, 
was born Leonard Wood, army surgeon, colonel of the 
"Rough Riders," and major-general of the United States 
Army. In Francestown was born Levi Woodbury, lawyer, 
jurist, congressman, and United States senator. 

The Mount Kearsarge Region 

When I was a boy, the mountain peak that most attracted 
my longing eyes was Mount Kearsarge, rising blue in the 
western horizon on the verge of the fertile valley of the 
Merrimac River. On the foot-slopes of this lone granite 
peak lies the rural town of Sutton, the birthplace of John 
Eaton, of whose record New Hampshire has good reason to 
be proud. 

He was the eldest of a family of nine children. At four 
years of age he entered the little district school. He was 
bred, as a boy, to hard work on his father's farm in spring 
and summer, and to earnest study at school in winter. But 
while he worked on the farm He also read and studied by 
himself. Then he went to Thetford Academy and began 
the study of Latin. At sixteen years of age he taught his 
first school in New Hampshire. Next he worked his way 
through Dartmouth College, graduating in 1854 with only 
three cents left in his pocket. He secured the principal- 
ship of a grammar school in Cleveland, Ohio, where he 
taught for two years. 

His success secured for him an appointment as superin- 
tendent of public schools in the city of Toledo, Ohio. Next 
he entered Andover Theological Seminary and was ordained 
for the ministry, but, instead of preaching, he enlisted in 
the Union Army and was commissioned chaplain in the 
Twenty-seventh Ohio Volunteer Infantry. He was made 



THE MOUNT KEARSARGE REGION 293 

colonel of the Ninth Regiment of United States Colored 
Infantry, and on recommendation of General Grant, was 
commissioned brevet brigadier general of volunteers. 

During the war, as fast as the Union lines were extended 
southward, General Eaton established schools for colored 
freedmen. In 1867 he was elected superintendent of pub- 
lic instruction for the state of Tennessee. The crowning 
work of his life was done after his appointment by Presi- 
dent Grant as United States Commissioner of Education 
in 1871. 

John Pillsbury, one of the early settlers on a farm in this 
hill town of Sutton, was the father of four typical New 
Hampshire boys, born and bred on a farm and educated in 
the common schools. One of these boys, John Seargent 
Pillsbury, born in 1827, after leaving school at sixteen years 
of age, began his business career as a clerk in his brother's 
store, then emigrated to Minnesota, settled at Minne- 
apolis, entered into the hardware business, acquired a for- 
tune, and was elected governor for three successive terms. 
His brother, George Alfred Pillsbury, at an early age be- 
came clerk to a Boston merchant, next a purchasing agent of 
the Boston and Concord Railroad, bank president, member 
of the legislature, and, finally, followed his brother to Min- 
neapolis and entered into the milling business of C. A. 
Pillsbury and Company, composed of his brother, Governor 
John S. Pillsbury, with his brother's sons, C. A. Pillsbury 
and Fred C. Pillsbury. The flour mills of this company 
became the most extensive in the United States, turning 
out at one time seven thousand barrels of flour a day. 

The youngest brother of this family, Benjamin F. Pills- 
bury, born in 1831, remained in his native town for forty- 
seven years and then emigrated to Minnesota, engaged in 



294 PILGRIMAGE TO NEW ENGLAND 

the lumber business, purchased timber lands, and became 
a millionaire. 

The first-born son, Simon Wadleigh Pillsbury (1812), was 
the only one of this family that received anything more 
than a common-school education. Simon was sent to Dart- 
mouth College, from which he graduated with high honor 
as a mathematician, but overstudy broke down his health, 
and he died at the beginning of his career. 

Near Mount Kearsarge, in the valley of the Merrimac 
River, lies the homestead of Captain Ebenezer Webster, 
in the town of Salisbury, where was born the greatest of 
the sons of New Hampshire, teacher, lawyer, orator, and 
statesman, Daniel Webster. Here too was born Ezekiel 
Webster, elder brother of Daniel. He was educated in 
the common school, Boscawen Academy, and Dartmouth 
College, and was a successful lawyer. 

The towns of this central part of the valley of the Merri- 
mac sent forth a remarkable set of men that won their way 
into historical records. In Hillsborough was born Franklin 
Pierce, a farmer boy who became a lawyer, governor of his 
native state, senator, and president of the United States. 
In Boscawen were born General John A. Dix, adopted by 
New York and made governor and United States senator; 
William Pitt Fessenden, adopted by the state of Maine and 
sent to the senate of the United States; Charles Carle ton 
Coffin, farmer boy, war correspondent during the Civil War, 
historian, and journalist; and Moody Currier, journalist and 
governor of his native state. 

In Warner was born General Walter Harriman, teacher, 
veteran of the Civil War, and governor of New Hampshire. 
Concord claims William E. Chandler, lawyer, and United 
States senator; Joseph C. Abbott, soldier, lawyer, journalist, 



OTHER NEW HAMPSHIRE BOYS 295 

and senator; and Frank W. Rollins, lawyer, banker, and 
governor. 

The town of Acworth claims as a native son Hiram 
Orcutt, a typical farmer boy, with slender means but with 
indomitable energy, who worked his way through common 
school, academy, and college, and then during forty years 
held various educational positions as a professional teacher. 

In Pembroke was born Thomas W. Knox, who was 
newspaper correspondent and author of numerous books of 
travel for boys; in Dunbarton, Carroll D. Wright, soldier, 
labor commissioner, university lecturer, statistician, and 
president of Clark College. 

Croydon, in the valley of the Connecticut, is the native 
town of the Reverend Samuel Read Hall, the pioneer 
teacher of the first private normal school in New England, 
and the author of "Lectures on School Keeping," the first 
handbook for teachers published in the United States in 
the English language. His biography may be found in 
Barnard's "American Teachers and Educators." 

Newport is the birthplace of Austin Corbin, railroad 
president and millionaire, who, beginning with the small 
hill farm on which he passed his boyhood, enlarged it by 
degrees into the " Corbin Game Preserve," which now 
includes several thousand acres of woodland and pasture, 
eleven miles in length by four miles in its greatest width. 
It is stocked with herds of buffalo, elk, deer, and other wild 
animals. 

In Cornish was born Salmon P. Chase, who emigrated to 
Ohio, where his first public position was that of school 
examiner in Cincinnati. He became a political leader, 
secretary of the treasury, and chief justice of the Supreme 
Court of the United States. Center Harbor is the birth- 



296 PILGRIMAGE TO NEW ENGLAND 

place of James H. Smart, educator, author, and college 
president, who was three times elected state superintendent 
of public instruction in Indiana. 

Rochester, bordering on Maine, claims as a native son 
John P. Hale, who began his education in the common 
school, continued it in Phillips-Exeter Academy and Bow- 
doin College, studied law, was elected to the state legisla- 
ture, and then to the senate of the United States, where 
for two years he was the first open and avowed opponent 
of the extension of slavery in the territories. 

In Farmington, contiguous to Rochester, was born to 
poverty Henry Wilson, of Scotch-Irish descent. At ten 
years of age he was " bound out" to a farmer, for whom he 
worked until he was twenty-one years of age. He was 
allowed to attend the common school only one month each 
year, but meanwhile he borrowed and read many books. 
When his long term of service expired, he went to Natick, 
Massachusetts, to learn the shoemaker's trade. As soon 
as he had earned money enough to pay his way, he entered 
Stratford Academy, and began teaching in the winter 
terms of the common school. Next, he was elected to the 
state legislature of Massachusetts (1850) and five years 
later was elected United States senator to succeed Edward 
Everett. In 1872 he was elected vice-president of the 
United States. 

My Native Town 

On my way down from the summit of Catamount I 
lingered in the little graveyard where a plain headstone 
marks the grave of my great-grandfather on the maternal 
side, — Elder David Knowlton. Far below me lay the 
fields where I had once raked hay, and the pasture from 



MY NATIVE TOWN 297 

which when a " barefoot boy" I drove home the cows. 
Next I rambled through Pittsfield village and made a visit 
to the one-room brick schooihouse in which I sat as a school- 
boy. The building was in good repair, but its doors were 
closed for the summer vacation. When I looked for the 
old academy, I found in its place a well-planned high- 
school building, and, a few blocks distant, a modern brick 
grammar-school building in which were centralized all the 
grammar-grade pupils in the town. A few of the old dis- 
trict school-houses in parts of the town remote from the 
village were still in use for primary-grade pupils. 

On the green fronting the old academy grounds there 
stood a beautiful monument on a granite pedestal with this 
inscription: "To all her sons who enlisted to defend and 
perpetuate the Union, Pittsfield dedicates this monument." 
Pittsfield has good reasons to be proud of its war record. 
In 1 86 1 the population of the town did not exceed two thou- 
sand, and the assessment roll of taxable property amounted 
in round numbers to $636,000 Yet this little rural town 
raised and expended for war purposes, from 1861 to 1865, 
the sum of $152,000 — about one-fourth of the total valua- 
tion of the town. Of the 147 men from this town who en- 
listed in the Union Army, 59 were killed in battle, or died 
in Andersonville prison, or were discharged from further 
service on account of disability from wounds. Most of the 
remaining ninety-eight men returned home with broken 
health, and many of them died a lingering death in 
hospitals. 1 

1 Mr. Henry L. Robinson, who served during the war and lived to write 
a history of "Pittsfield, New Hampshire, in the Great Rebellion," claims 
for his native town the following distinctions : 

i. Pittsfield was the first town in the state, and perhaps in the entire 



298 PILGRIMAGE TO NEW ENGLAND 

After leaving the monument, I walked down to the house 
in which my grandfather, Abraham French, lived and died. 
I found living there Captain Asa Bartlett, a veteran son of 
Pittsfield, who had served during the Civil War and had lived 
to write the history of the 12 th New Hampshire Volunteers, 
a well- written book of nearly a thousand pages. He was 
slowly wasting away from illness contracted in army service. 
He died not many months after I saw him. His brother, 
Dr. Bradbury H. Bartlett, enlisted in Company E, 1st 
New Hampshire Heavy Artillery, and was assigned to 
hospital service. Then I called on my cousin, Charles 
French, who enlisted in Company G, 15 th New Hampshire 
Volunteers, and served with a creditable record. 

A Pleasant Interview 

Two delightful days I passed on Jenness Hill at the 
home of my cousin Samuel Jenness, whose mother was 
Betsey (Swett) Jenness. The two brothers, Samuel Jen- 
ness, Senior, and John Jenness, Senior, were among the 
early settlers of Pittsfield from the town of Hampton. 

North, to vote aid to soldiers' families, and that too without hope of being 
reimbursed from any source. 

2. That the town raised more money according to its valuation to carry 
on the war than any other town. 

3. That no other town sent a larger proportion of its inhabitants, — ■ 
nearly twice its quota. 

Mr. Robinson's war history of Pittsfield, a volume of 217 pages, contains 
a short sketch of the record of every enlisted man from that town, and is 
illustrated with pictures of forty-eight veterans. It is a volume of pathetic 
interest. The record of men shot dead on the field of battle, not including 
those mortally wounded who died in hospitals, shows as follows: 

Gettysburg, 3; Chancellorsville, 3; Fort Wayne, 2; Port Hudson, 1; other 
battles, 2. Known to have died in Andersonville prison, 4. 



A PLEASANT INTERVIEW 299 

They bought adjoining farms, built substantial farmhouses 
and barns, and soon had two of the best homesteads in the 
town. Both farms are owned and tilled by their descendants 
and are still productive. I called on the widow of John 
Jenness, then ninety-two years of age, and found her busy 
about light housework, apparently as erect and active as 
her daughter that was working with her. Her mind seemed 
unimpaired and her memory retentive. I asked her if she 
knew my father, and her reply was: "Did I know your 
father? Well, I should think I did. Why, he boarded 
with me in this very house one whole winter, when he was 
teaching our school." 

"What kind of a teacher was he?" 

"He was the best teacher we ever had. Everybody liked 
him. He was very popular and one of the nicest young 
men I ever knew." 

"Did you know my mother?" 

"Know her! Why, she helped me make up my wedding 
outfit." 

From this charming old lady I learned many interesting 
incidents about my father and mother that I had never 
heard of before. I had several interviews with her after- 
wards, and we became well acquainted. 

"Give me your arm," she said during one call. "I want 
to show you something." And then she took me into her 
parlor, that sacred sanctum of the New England housewife, 
and pointed out her wedding furniture, her samplers of 
needlework, family photographs, etc. Then as we were 
walking back, she laughed and said: "Now, here's my 
daughter — she never married. She never looked at a 
man. She wouldn't have married the angel Gabriel if he 
had come down and made love to her." 



300 PILGRIMAGE TO NEW ENGLAND 

Dear old lady ! She passed away two years after I saw 
her, as peacefully as a child going to sleep. 

The White Mountains 

After a six days' visit at Pittsfield, in company with my 
cousin John C. French, I passed a delightful week in the 
White Mountain region, making various excursions from 
Deer Park Hotel in the Pemigwasset Valley. 

We ascended Mount Washington; saw the "Old Man of 
the Mountain" in the Franconia Notch; visited the Flume; 
and studied the effects of glacial denudation as far as limited 
time allowed. The Franconia Notch is a miniature Yose- 
mite Valley; it bears unmistakable evidence of the enormous 
power of the great ice sheet which sculptured and eroded 
and ground down the mountains during the glacial period. 
On the carriage road that winds along the Franconia Notch 
we passed for two miles through a primeval forest of hard- 
wood trees — maple, beech, and birch — untouched by the 
woodcutter's ax, save in the narrow clearing made for a 
carriage road. The effect of the summer sunlight as it 
trickled through the thick masses of green leaves upon the 
ground below, the play of sunshine and shadow, the grace 
of the slender tree trunks, impressed me as the most beau- 
tiful bit of woodland scenery my eye had ever beheld. I 
was glad to learn, two years afterwards, that the owner of 
the tract had set it apart as a woodland public reserve, and 
had placed it in trust in the hands of the state Society for 
the Preservation of Forests. 

All too soon my stay in New Hampshire came to an end. 
I bade good-by to my cousin, Mr. French, and we parted, 
never to meet again. A year later he was thrown from his 
carriage by a runaway team, and received injuries from 



THE PILGRIMAGE ENDED 301 

which he died, after lingering for some months. I remained 
in Boston for two weeks, passing my time in libraries and 
in companionship with Dr. Mayo, and then visited the 
home of my cousin, the Reverend John W. Lane, at North 
Hadley, in the valley of the Connecticut, from which I 
took short trips to Deerrield, Hadley, Holyoke, and other 
spots of historic interest. 

A ten days' stay in New York city rounded out my 
vacation. While there I made arrangements for the pub- 
lication of my book, " American Public Schools," and then 
turned my face homeward by way of the Great Northern 
Railway. I reached home in time to vote at the state 
election and to deliver an address, at the annual meeting of 
the California Teachers' Association, on the " Evolution of 
the American Common Schools." 



CHAPTER XVIII 

OUR HOME LIFE AT HILL GIRT FARM; MY CLASS IN 
HISTORY AND LITERATURE; AND INCIDENTAL 
EDUCATIONAL WORK 

On many accounts I regretted to give up educational 
work and to leave the city which had been my home for 
forty years. But, on the other hand, I was glad to escape 
from the hard routine of official duties; glad to lead an 
active life out of doors; glad to have some leisure for read- 
ing, thinking, and writing; rejoiced to be in some measure 
my own master. 

Our country home lies nestled among the hills of Contra 

Costa County, in the Alhambra Valley, thirty-five miles, by 

way of the Southern Pacific Railway, from San Francisco to 

Martinez, and two miles from Muir station on the Santa Fe 

Railway. There are also easy facilities for shipping fruit 

products to San Francisco on the steamboats that ply in 

the waters of the bay of San Francisco and up and down 

the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers. We are four miles 

from Martinez, the county seat, on the water front of San 

Francisco Bay. Martinez is an incorporated town which 

has three thousand inhabitants, two banks, one daily and 

two weekly newspapers, a public library, a high school, and 

a large grammar-school building recently erected at a cost 

of $35,000. This town is lighted by electricity conducted 

by an electric cable from the power house a hundred miles 

distant on the Feather River, near the spot on which I was 

engaged in mining half a century ago. 

302 




Mrs. John Swett 



303 



304 HOME LIFE AT HILL GIRT FARM 

For itself the Alhambra Valley is small in area, being 
only six miles in length and from one to two miles in variable 
width. Extending southward from an arm of San Francisco 
Bay known as the straits of Carquinez, it is hemmed in by 
nearly parallel ridges of picturesque hills that are covered 
with a luxuriant growth of oaks. 

The average annual rainfall, of from twenty-five to thirty- 
five inches, is ample to secure crops without irrigation. 
The heat of summer is tempered by the cool and moist sea 
breezes that make the climate ideal. 

. It was in 1 88 1, when visiting my friend John Muir, that 
I climbed one of the Alhambra hills and looked down on 
the level fertile valley watered by a winding creek fringed 
with sycamores and live oaks. The scenery seemed a bit 
of New Hampshire hill country transported to California. 
To the eastward Monte Diablo, four thousand feet high 
and ten miles distant, in air line, reminded me of Mount 
Kearsarge, which rose blue in the horizon in plain view from 
my father's farm in the old Granite State. Near at hand, 
the Briones hills, forming the southern wall of the valley, 
seemed a reproduction of Catamount, at the base of 
which lay the hill farm on which I was born. Captivated 
by this charming prospect, I immediately began negotia- 
tions for the purchase of a section of the widest part of the 
valley, and after some delay succeeded in buying it for 
$7000 cash payment. This tract included an area of 185 
acres suitably divided into "tillage, pasturage, and wood- 
land," after the manner of a New England farm. A moun- 
tain stream ran through the middle of the forty acres of rich 
bottom land. There were sixty acres of sloping hillsides 
suitable for vineyards, and eighty acres of woodland and 
pasturage. The place had Ions - been rented as a stock and 



FARM MANAGEMENT 305 

hay farm, and there were no improvements on it except a 
few fences, an old barn, and a house built of sundried brick, 
with walls three feet thick. There were no fruit trees, save 
one solitary fig tree. 

"Hill Girt," as my wife named the farm, was bought 
neither for speculation nor for money-making, but as a kind 
of old-age home to which we could retire after school wort 
was ended. Moreover, I had inherited a love of country 
life from six generations of Puritan farmers. Furthermore, 
my wife was fond of quiet life in the country. 

Our farm was subject to a lease for one year, and we did 
not take formal possession of it until October, 1882, when we 
began improvements by hiring a foreman and planting out 
five acres of table grapes and a few acres of fruit trees. 
The following year the vineyard was enlarged by planting 
twenty acres with table grapes. Though my own direct 
supervision was limited to weekly visits on Saturdays and 
to school vacations, I managed to keep general run of 
affairs. I started out with a firm resolution to limit ex- 
penses to my income, and not to run in debt under any 
condition. Owing to my wife's prudent household man- 
agement, at least one-half of my annual salary of three 
thousand dollars could be applied to farm expenses. Thus, 
year by year, Hill Girt was gradually improved, and we 
looked forward hopefully to the time when our income 
would equal expenses. 

During these four years there was no income whatever 
from vines or fruit trees, as they had not yet come into 
bearing. In 1887 a part of the vineyard yielded a fair crop, 
amounting to $1335, but the expenses exceeded the income. 

It was in July, 1889, that I retired from school and as- 
sumed personal charge of the farm. I found the condition 



306 HOME LIFE AT HILL GIRT FARM 

of affairs such that I needed the help of my eldest son, who 
was then at the end of his sophomore year in the State 
University of California. Frank Tracy Swett began his 
education in the grammar schools of San Francisco, was 
graduated with credit from Lowell High School, where he 
proved himself a serious-minded student with steady habits 
and strong character. At the university he pursued an 
elective course, taking chemistry as a major, along with 
trigonometry, literature, botany, and viticulture, maintain- 
ing a good rank in his class. It was my hope that in a year 
he would be able to return and complete his course. I made 
him foreman of the farm with a salary of six hundred dollars 
a year and his board. We both worked hard to put the vine- 
yard into better condition, so that it should pay running 
expenses. In the autumn of 1890, when I was elected 
superintendent of common schools in San Francisco, it 
became necessary for Frank to remain in charge of the 
farm and give up the remainder of his course in the State 
University. 

I returned to my city house, which, meanwhile, had been 
occupied by my daughter and her husband, John W. 
Parkhurst. My wife, two sons, and my aged mother re- 
mained at Hill Girt, where I made them weekly visits on 
Saturday and Sunday. At times my wife's mother made 
her home with the family. 

During the succeeding four years the products of the 
farm increased year by year, so that I was able to build an 
addition to the dwelling house, to enlarge the vineyard, and 
to make various other improvements. 

At the expiration of my four years' term of office, I 
returned to Hill Girt with a fixed determination to remain 
there for life. We established the business firm of "John 




My Mother in her Old Age 



307 



308 HOME LIFE AT HILL GIRT FARM 

Swett and Son." My son was paid a fair salary for keeping 
the books and conducting the business correspondence, leav- 
ing me free to select the work best suited to my tastes. 
On a fruit farm of one hundred acres under cultivation 
there is always work all the year round, of a kind requiring 
constant watchfulness and care. 

The even tenor of our family life was soon broken by the 
death of my mother, who fell from her chair stricken with 
partial paralysis. She lingered for three weeks, and then 
passed peacefully away on the 5 th day of March, 1896, in 
the ninety-second year of her age. For twenty-five years 
she had been a loved and honored member of our family 
circle, watched over with tender care. We buried her by 
the side of her granddaughter, Mrs. Emily (Swett) Park- 
hurst, in the cemetery near Oakland. Four years previous 
to my mother's death our family circle had been broken by 
the death of my wife's mother, Mrs. Emily (Stone) Tracy, 
who had made her home with us for twenty years. She 
died at the age of seventy-seven years, in a health retreat 
in Napa Valley, whither she had gone for medical treatment. 
We laid her body to rest in Laurel Hill Cemetery, in the 
shadow of the granite shaft erected to the memory of her 
husband, Judge Frederic P. Tracy. 

In 1897 Frank Tracy Swett, my eldest son, was married to 
Myrta Wallace More, stepdaughter of the Reverend August 
Drahms, and a graduate of the state normal school at San 
Jose. She taught the district school adjacent to Hill Girt, 
and entered our family as a boarder. Frank fell in love 
with her and he secured one of the best of wives, though 
the school lost a good teacher. As a wedding present to 
Frank we deeded him a one-fourth undivided interest in 
Hill Girt farm. ■ 



REPLANTING THE VINEYARD 309 

The year 1898 marked the beginning of a period of disas- 
ter on Hill Girt farm, for we discovered in the vineyard 
unmistakable evidence of the appearance of that most 
destructive of all vine pests, the Phylloxera, a graperoot 
aphis, barely discernible without the aid of a microscope, 
but destructive in its ravages on all varieties of European 
vinifera. Introduced into France on some American native 
grapevines, in the course of forty years it destroyed at 
least three-fourths of the French vineyards, which were 
renewed by planting out certain American wild vines, 
found to be resistant to the vine aphis, and by grafting this 
stock with European varieties. The Phylloxera has killed 
out thousands of acres of vineyard in California during the 
last thirty years, and it is still slowly but surely extending 
its ravages. 

We at once secured from the State University a small 
stock of resistant cuttings from which to propagate vines 
for replanting our vineyard as fast as the old vines died out. 
We fortunately selected the Rupestris St. George, the variety 
that has been most extensively used in France, and which 
has proved best adapted to our own conditions. 

For five years we were busily engaged in replanting, and 
at the end of that time the last of our old vines had been 
dug up and their places filled with European varieties 
grafted upon resistant roots. Our resistant vines began 
to come into bearing four years after planting, and the cost 
of planting and cultivating during that time we estimate 
at $125 an acre. Our loss in the gradual failure of crops, 
added to the cost of replanting, we estimate at $25,000. 
However, with our orchard products of Bartlett pears, 
prunes, and cherries, together with large sales of grafted 
and rooted resistant vines from our thirty-acre nursery 



310 HOME LIFE AT HILL GIRT FARM 

at Ripon, in the San Joaquin Valley, we have been able to 
pull through without running into debt. We have suc- 
ceeded by hard work, economical management, and a con- 
stant study of new conditions. 

My son Frank is the business manager. Besides, he 
owns and cultivates a new twenty-acre vineyard contiguous 
to Hill Girt, living now in his own home with his wife and 
two children, Margaret and Elizabeth. He is employed 
at times by the State University to lecture at Farmers' 
Institutes on grape-growing and on resistant stock, on 
which subjects he is regarded as a practical expert. 

Our granddaughter, Ruth Emelie Parkhurst, is a member 
of our household, attending the high school at Martinez, 
riding on horseback, or driving to and fro, eight miles a day. 
Her father, an employee in the Bank of California, comes up 
every Saturday night and stays over Sunday. 

Our daughter Helen often visits us, bringing sunshine 
into our home. Her education was begun in the public 
schools in San Francisco, and continued in the state normal 
school at San Jose, from which she was graduated in 1895. 
She taught in a small rural school in Mendocino County for 
one term, and then entered Stanford University, from which 
she was graduated (1899) with high standing in biology, 
botany, and social science. Then she was engaged for three 
years in teaching biology in the Alameda high school and 
in directing nature study in the elementary schools. Dur- 
ing this time she was betrothed to Ernest Schwartz, a 
graduate of Stanford, a teacher and law student. They 
were to be married in a few months, when suddenly Mr. 
Schwartz had an attack of appendicitis and died during a 
surgical operation. Helen gave up teaching to enter on a 
life of philanthropic work by engaging as an assistant in the 



MY CLASS IN HISTORY AND LITERATURE 311 

office and field work of the Associated Charities of the 
city of Oakland. 

After the earthquake and fire in San Francisco in 1906, 
she was transferred to that city for relief work, and was 
finally placed in a responsible position in directing the dis- 
tribution of the large sum contributed by the New York 
City Chamber of Commerce for aiding needy people to make 
a new start in earning their own living, in which position 
she won a high reputation for executive ability. 

My Class in History and Literature 

During three long years, for two hours each day, I was 
engaged in teaching a private school limited to one pupil, 
and held in my own house at Hill Girt. In March, 1899, 
my youngest son, John French Swett, then near the end 
of his sophomore year in Stanford University, was taken 
down with the measles, which prevailed as an epidemic at 
that institution. After apparently recovering, he came 
home, stayed ten days, and then returned to his class. 
Three days later he was attacked with retinitis in a severe 
form. He came back with his eyes heavily bandaged, and 
entered a darkened room in which he was confined for seven 
weary months, never once going out of it during the day- 
light. The inflammation of the retina made sunlight un- 
bearable, though his clearness of vision was not perceptibly 
affected. At the end of a year he was able, by wearing 
blue glasses, to go out of doors for exercise early in the 
morning or towards evening, but not in the middle of the 
day. The oculist who treated him said that recovery 
would be very slow. It had now become evident that he 
must give up all hope of ever being able to complete his 
course at the university, or to pursue the study of law, on 



312 HOME LIFE AT HILL GIRT FARM 

which he had set his heart. His disappointment was great, 
but he bore up under it with the heroism of a martyr. As 
a boy in the common schools, and in the Lowell High School 
in San Francisco, he had ranked high in his classes. In 
Stanford University he took an elective course looking to 
the legal profession, and Professor E. A. Ross said of him 
that he was one of the three most promising students in his 
class of one hundred members. His health was good and 
his habits were exceptionally regular. When a child he 
learned to read under the old-style instruction of his two 
grandmothers, before he was five years old, and long before 
he went to school at six years of age he was a regular 
reader of the St. Nicholas magazine. He inherited a taste 
for books as strong as my own. 

As the prospect of his recovering the use of his eyes for 
reading seemed far in the future, I determined to lend him 
my own eyes for the purpose of keeping him alive intellec- 
tually. I planned a systematic course of reading which 
seemed to be best adapted to his particular needs. I found 
by questioning him that he knew something about the 
history of Greece and Rome, picked up in his classical 
course in the high school, but about the history of our own 
country he knew little or nothing. Therefore I began the 
history lessons by reading one hour in the forenoon and 
one hour in the afternoon, until we had read the following 
list of books: John Fiske's Beginnings of New England; 
The Dutch and Quaker Colonies in America; Old Virginia 
and Her Neighbors; The American Revolution; Historical 
Essays; and The Discovery of America. 

Next we took up Parkman's historical works, six or seven 
volumes in all. Parkman was followed by Nicolay and 
Hay's Abraham Lincoln; Lincoln's State Papers, in part 5 



MY CLASS IN HISTORY AND LITERATURE 313 

Lincoln's Speeches in the Douglas Campaign; McMaster's 
Life of Daniel Webster; Webster's most notable orations; 
Webster's speeches in the Hayne debate in the senate; 
Memoirs of General Grant; Woodrow Wilson's History of 
the American People, five volumes, in part; Lodge's Story 
of the Revolution; Green's History of the English People; 
Motley's Dutch Republic, in part; Motley's Netherlands, 
in part; McMaster's History of the People of the United 
States, five volumes, in part; and in part, Hannis Taylor's 
Origin and Growth of the English Constitution. 

In science and general literature, the following list in- 
cludes a part of the books which we read : Huxley's works, 
in part; extracts from Tyndall and Darwin; Herbert Spen- 
cer, two volumes, in part; John Fiske's Excursions of an 
Evolutionist; Fiske's Darwinism and other lectures; Fiske's 
Destiny of Man, Idea of God, Life Everlasting, Through 
Nature up to Nature's God, and A Century of Science; 
David Starr Jordan's Care and Culture of Man, The Voice 
of the Scholar, Foot Notes in Evolution, and numerous 
other papers and lectures by the same writer; John Muir's 
Mountains of California, and Our National Parks; extracts 
from Ralph Waldo Emerson's works; and half a dozen books 
on political economy and social science. Added to the 
above list, there were a large number of articles, scientific 
and literary, from standard magazines. 

Occasionally, by way of variety, I read short poems 
from Whittier, Longfellow, Holmes, and Lowell, — poems 
that delighted me when I was about the age of my boy. 
From the Bible we read the book of Job entire; selec- 
tions from Proverbs, Genesis, the Psalms, and the New 
Testament. 

Of the magazines from which I. read many selections, my 



314 HOME LIFE AT HILL GIRT FARM 

pupil was most deeply interested in the World's Work, every 
number of which, from the beginning of its publication until 
the present time, has been read through from beginning to 
end, to the never-failing interest of the listener as well as 
that of the reader. From the other magazines which we 
take, such as the Century, Harper's, McClure's and the 
Outlook, I selected articles of special note, whether scientific, 
literary, or political. From the daily papers I gleaned the 
general news of the world and the current political news of 
our own country. 

I have not given the preceding list as " the best books 
in the world that everybody ought to read." The books 
that seemed to me to be well suited to the needs of my par- 
ticular pupil were selected without reference to the tastes 
of others. 

During the long years of this reading course, my wife 
was an assistant teacher, who ably supplemented my own 
reading. She read wise selections from the works of Dickens 
and Thackeray, Bret Harte, and Mark Twain, and occa- 
sionally from the driftwood of recent fiction in magazines 
or in book form. Boswell's Johnson, Pepys' Diary, Hit- 
tell's History of California, four volumes, and numerous 
miscellaneous volumes of current literature. Whenever I 
was called away from home on business she more than filled 
my chair. 

The eyes of our student gradually became strong enough 
to enable him to engage in light work about the farm in the 
morning and towards evening, and at length to work four 
or five hours a day, for which he was paid regular wages. 
In time he was able to read a few minutes daily, and to 
write short letters on the typewriter. Day dawned after 
the long cheerless arctic night. Recently he has received 



INCIDENTAL EDUCATIONAL WORK 315 

a deed of an undivided one-fourth interest in Hill Girt farm. 
Fortunately, his general health is good, and he keeps up a 
degree of cheerfulness that excites my admiration, because 
in my youthful days I also passed through the fiery furnace 
of affliction. 

Earthquake and Fire 

In April, 1906, our business was disturbed to some extent 
by the earthquake and fire which wrecked the business sec- 
tion of San Francisco. Our house in the city, which had 
been our home for more than twenty years, in which four 
of our six children had been born and in which two had 
died, was not damaged by the earthquake, because it was 
situated high on the eastern slope of Russian Hill, on Taylor 
Street, but it was reduced to ashes two days later by the 
wave of fire that swept up the long hill slope from the water 
front. 

Incidental Educational Work 

Though most of my own time has been occupied in farm 
work, I have taken an incidental interest in educational 
affairs. In 1897 I accepted an appointment as a member 
of the county board of education in my own county, for 
the purpose of securing a revision of the course of study, 
from which I retired after accomplishing my work. I have 
attended the annual county teachers' institutes and taken 
part in the proceedings. 

By regular attendance at the annual meetings of the 
California Teachers' Association, I have kept up my ac- 
quaintance with teachers and renewed many old-time 
friendships. I began a revision of my book entitled 
"Methods of Teaching." When this work was completed 



316 HOME LIFE AT HILL GIRT FARM 

it proved so unsatisfactory that I set it aside and wrote a 
volume entitled "American Public Schools." The intro- 
ductory half of this book treated of the origin and develop- 
ment of the district and town schools of colonial times, of 
grammar schools, academies, and high schools, and the 
primitive textbooks which indicated their course of study. 
This involved an extended course of historical research, 
which led me to take a trip to New England for the purpose 
of getting access to numerous town histories, the original 
sources of information about the evolution of the common 
schools. 

In 1 90 1 I took an active part in the organization of the 
Alhambra Union High School, formed by the combination of 
five school districts, of which Martinez is the center. From 
the beginning, I have acted as chairman of the board of 
trustees. We carried an election for the issue of bonds 
for $10,000 and built a well-planned schoolhouse, which 
is not excelled in point of convenience, arrangement, and 
architecture by any small high-school building in the 
state. 

I have kept in touch with the educators of the state by 
attending the quarterly meetings of The Schoolmasters' 
Club. I am also doing duty as one of five members of the 
advisory board of editors of the Western Journal of Educa- 
tion, the official organ of the state board of education. 

In 1906 I was appointed by Governor Pardee as a member 
of the board of trustees of the state normal school at San 
Francisco, to fill a short term vacancy, and was reappointed 
by Governor Gillet in 1907. I am also known as an "honor- 
ary lecturer" before the Department of Education in the 
State University. 

The meeting of the National Educational Association in 



EMERSON E. WHITE'S EULOGIUM 317 

July, 1899, at Los Angeles, brought to the Pacific coast 
large numbers of distinguished educators from the East, 
among whom was Emerson E. White of Ohio, whom I had 
not seen since the Boston meeting of 1872. At the first 
general session, after the customary addresses of welcome, 
Mr. White read an able paper in response, and then went 
on to speak as follows: 

Some thirty years ago I watched with interest the development of the 
school system of California. If my memory serves me, California was the 
first state in the Union to adopt a graded course of study for its rural schools. 
I examined this state course of study with much interest, and this was espe- 
cially true of the accompanying manual prepared by the state school depart- 
ment for the guidance of teachers. While this early movement unduly 
emphasized the principle of uniformity in school administration, a principle 
that has everywhere been the source of serious evils in school affairs, the Cal- 
ifornia experiment, as it was called, inspired efforts in different sections of 
the country to provide graded courses of study for rural schools, resulting her,e 
and there in the adoption of town or township courses, county courses, and, 
more recently, state courses. 

In 1872 the National Educational Association met in Boston. In arrang- 
ing the program fcr that meeting, I desired to see California represented by 
its foremost educator, and so I invited John Swett to give one of the prin- 
cipal addresses. He kindly accepted the invitation and came across the 
continent to render the service. In their appreciative notices of Mr. Swett's 
address the Boston papers referred to him as the " Horace Mann of the Pa- 
cific coast," a high and fitting honor. President Lyte at this point stated 
that he desired to introduce a man whose name was not on the program, an 
educator whose name was an inspiration to teachers throughout the land, a 
man who for a generation had stood preeminent in the profession — the 
Honorable John Swett. 

When I heard this address, I learned for the first time 
why Mr. White had invited me to address the Boston 
meeting. This is what I said as I was called unexpectedly 
upon the stage in response to Mr. White's eulogium: 

Members of the National Educational Association and fellow teachers of 
the United States of America, now, thank God, united never to be divided 



318 HOME LIFE AT HILL GIRT FARM 

again : I appear before you as one of the few survivors of the old educational 
guard in California. I have no doubt the president introduced me as an 
awful example of the conservatism of the past, and the antediluvian con- 
dition of California years ago. I really don't know, myself, exactly where 
I do belong. Born in the Old Granite State, I once thought myself a 
Yankee. When I was twenty-two I drifted to California and soon became 
a native son. Last year I made a visit to my native state and in three 
months became a New Englander. When I recrossed the continent, I turned 
my coat and was transformed into a Calif ornian. Now the only things I 
am quite certain about are that I am an American citizen and that I must 
be growjng old. 

Why, the other day I met on the street a bald-headed man who grabbed 
my hand and exclaimed, "Don't you know me? I used to go to school to 
you." I looked him over carefully and replied hesitatingly, "You must be 
mistaken, my good friend. It seems to me that you were the teacher, and 
that I was one of your boys." So we parted sorrowfully, not knowing 
exactly where we stood. 

Well, I am willing to be taken as a fair sample of the teachers in the early 
days of California. We worked hard. We were ambitious. Most of us 
came here expecting to get rich in the mines. We failed in that, and then 
turned in and did harder work in the public schools. 

It gave me great pleasure to listen to my friend, Mr. White. He gave us 
a statesmanlike paper, and we ought to thank him for his words of wisdom 
and caution. There is a growing tendency in California towards uniformity 
and state centralization of power, which, if continued, might lead us into a 
kind of Chinese civilization. I have no love for Chinese uniformity in edu- 
cation. Mr. White is of New England descent, and the old-time belief 
in democratic town government runs in his blood and will stick there until 
he dies. 

I will not take up your time further, but if any member of this association 
thinks that I am going to disappear from the annual meetings because I 
belong to the age of Methuselah, he is altogether mistaken. You will see me, 
again and again, whenever I have money enough to cross the continent to 
attend them. 

Not many months after the Los Angeles meeting, Mr. 
White closed his school life, leaving a name written high on 
the roll of honor of great American educators. Mr. "White 
and Mr. William T. Harris were the two most notable 
educators that I met at the Boston meeting in 1872, 



SAN FRANCISCO STATE NORMAL SCHOOL 319 

As I write this closing chapter, our course of life at Hill 
Girt is running smoothly. We are not getting rich, but we 
make a comfortable living in spite of some unfavorable 
conditions of the market for fruit. We are not encum- 
bered by a mortgage. My wife, presiding over domestic 
affairs, seems, in spirit, as young as she was years ago, when 
we began to make the home of which she still remains the 
central sun. Though in my eightieth year, with my eyes 
turned to the setting sun, I find myself in fair health and in 
cheerful spirits. I take and read half a dozen school jour- 
nals, and still consider myself as a volunteer private in the 
ranks of educational reformers. I rejoice in exceeding 
gladness that my life has been prolonged until my eyes 
behold the splendor of the dawning day of a newer and 
better education. 

A few months ago, wishing to renew my youth, I visited 
the San Francisco State Normal School, and passed three 
whole days in quietly watching the six or seven hundred 
children in the training classes, all as busy as bees and 
happy as singing birds, because, under wise and skilled 
teachers, they were doing work suited to their ages and 
stages of development. 

I left this school feeling that an educational millenium 
had begun to dawn. As I walked briskly down Market 
Street, a fragment from a class-day poem by Oliver Wendell 
Holmes kept running in my head. 

"Hang the almanac's cheat and the catalogue's spite, 
Old Time is a liar, we're twenty to-night ! 
Gray temples at twenty ? Yes, white if you please, 
Where the snowflakes fall thickest, there's nothing can freeze." 

Not long after this school visit, Thanksgiving Day found 
our children and grandchildren gathered around the family 



320 HOME LIFE AT HILL GIRT FARM 

altar fires at Hill Girt holding a musical concert. John 
plays the flute and the banjo, Helen the guitar, Ruth the 
piano accompaniments, my wife selects the songs, and I 
am an appreciative listener. When my soul is filled with 
music, I steal away into the spacious dining room in the 
old adobe wing, and sit before the smoldering wood fire in 
the large fireplace. In imagination I see my aged mother 
sitting by my side in her favorite rocking-chair. Emily, 
with her thoughtful face, glides noiselessly into the room 
as if looking for her little daughter, Ruth, whom she left 
as an infant to our care, and who now seems to fill her 
mother's place in our affections. Next, I seem to see, 
lying in his cradle, our first-born boy, Willie, that lived 
with us only four months and then died from pneumonia. 
And then I am holding in my arms our third child, Walter, 
that died, when one year old, under the treatment of a 
physician that failed to understand his case. For thirty 
days and nights we watched over him as he clung tenaciously 
to life. I remember how, on the day before he died, I held 
before him my open watch to see if he was still conscious. 
He feebly lifted his tiny finger until it rested over the re- 
volving second hand, where he had so often been accus- 
tomed to place it, looked with a sad smile into my eyes, and 
then sank back upon his pillow. That hunting-case watch, 
which I still carry, reminds me daily of the dear little boy. 
When the whitening embers on the hearth die out, I take 
with me the sacred memories of the dead and go back to 
the parlor into the presence of the dear ones living, whose 
faces, beaming with joy, turn my shadows into sunshine, 
and I join in the laughter and the song. 



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